Sen. Marsha Blackburn has renewed a legislative effort to bar foreign nationals from using temporary visas to give birth in the United States and to classify birth tourism as a deportable offense.
By yourNEWS Media Newsroom.
Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., has reintroduced legislation designed to prevent foreign nationals from entering the United States on temporary visas for the purpose of giving birth and securing American citizenship for their children.
The Ban Birth Tourism Act would establish birth tourism as an impermissible basis for receiving a temporary U.S. visa. It would also amend federal immigration law to make participation in birth tourism grounds for inadmissibility and deportation.
Blackburn renewed the proposal following a Supreme Court ruling that invalidated President Donald Trump’s executive order restricting birthright citizenship.
In a 5-4 ruling in Trump v. Barbara, the court determined that denying birthright citizenship to U.S.-born children of illegal immigrants and foreign tourists violated the 14th Amendment.
“Following the Supreme Court’s decision in Trump v. Barbara, Congress must step up to the plate to protect the integrity of American citizenship,” Blackburn told Breitbart News on Friday.
Blackburn initially introduced the Ban Birth Tourism Act in May 2025. The renewed version has attracted support from six additional Republican senators: Ted Budd of North Carolina, John Cornyn of Texas, Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming, Tim Sheehy of Montana, Jim Banks of Indiana and Rick Scott of Florida.
“I’m grateful to my Republican colleagues for joining me in reintroducing the Ban Birth Tourism Act to make it crystal clear that any alien seeking to come to our country to engage in birth tourism is both inadmissible and deportable under the Immigration and Nationality Act,” Blackburn said.
Birth tourism generally involves a foreign national traveling to the United States while pregnant so the child will receive citizenship upon birth on American soil.
A revised 2020 report from the Center for Immigration Studies estimated that approximately 33,000 children are born in the United States annually to women who entered on tourist visas. Those children receive U.S. citizenship at birth and may later petition for their parents to obtain permanent residency after reaching adulthood, according to the report.
Blackburn’s legislation is one of several Republican proposals introduced after the Supreme Court’s decision. The measures take different approaches to restricting birthright citizenship or changing how federal law treats parents who enter the country illegally or specifically to give birth.
Banks told Newsmax on Tuesday that his proposed Citizenship Act of 2026 would designate people who illegally enter the United States, as well as those who enter for birth tourism, as “invaders.”
His proposal would amend the Immigration and Nationality Act to deny birthright citizenship to children born to people falling within those categories.
Rep. John McGuire, R-Va., introduced a separate measure last week titled the Birthright Citizenship Clarification Act of 2026.
McGuire’s legislation would seek to prevent automatic citizenship from being granted to children born in the United States to illegal immigrants and certain foreign nationals holding temporary visas.
Banks and McGuire have cited a separate opinion from Justice Brett Kavanaugh as a potential legislative path for imposing citizenship restrictions while addressing constitutional concerns raised by the court.
Kavanaugh concluded that Trump’s executive order conflicted with existing federal citizenship statutes. He wrote that Congress would first need to amend the Immigration and Nationality Act or pass new legislation before the proposed restrictions could be implemented.
“Justice Kavanaugh, in his concurrent opinion, gave us the keys to unlock and define who is eligible for birthright citizenship,” Banks told Newsmax.
“Congress must pass a bill to determine that. That’s what Kavanaugh said in his concurrent opinion. So that’s what my bill does,” he said.
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