SAIPAN — President Donald J. Trump has signed an executive order directing the federal government to shut down birth tourism, the practice of traveling to the United States on temporary visas to give birth on American soil, an industry that for years counted Saipan among its most documented destinations.
The order, signed Wednesday in Washington, declares it the policy of the United States to prevent the exploitation of nonimmigrant visa classifications by people engaging in birth tourism, which it defines as entering the country on a nonimmigrant visa for the purpose of giving birth, or facilitating such entry. “Citizenship is not a commodity to be acquired through calculated exploitation and evasion of the immigration laws,” the order states.
The order delegates the President’s authority under the Immigration and Nationality Act to the Secretaries of State and Homeland Security, who are directed to update rules and guidance to carry it out. The actions available to them include denying visas or travel authorization to anyone entering to engage in birth tourism, revoking visas and permanently barring entry of violators, removing anyone who previously engaged or plans to engage in the practice, and taking action against entities, organizations or individuals inside or outside the United States that facilitate or enable birth tourism in any manner.
The order describes an industry of operators using deceptive advertisements to entice foreign nationals, promising citizenship, public benefits and stays in specialized facilities while coaching clients to misrepresent their travel purpose to consular and border officials. It cites the exploitation of the women who travel to give birth among the harms.
The Secretaries may exempt a foreign national on humanitarian grounds or when entry is in the national interest.
What the order does not do is change birthright citizenship: children born on U.S. soil remain citizens under the Fourteenth Amendment, and the order operates entirely on entry, visas and enforcement. That distinguishes it from legislative proposals such as H.R. 9724, the bill by Congressman Morgan Griffith seeking to alter birthright citizenship in the CNMI, which this newsroom has covered in detail.
For the Marianas, the order lands on familiar ground. Through much of the 2010s, Saipan drew national attention as a birth tourism destination, with visitors entering through the region’s visa-free travel channels, and the Commonwealth Healthcare Corporation’s birth statistics at times showed non-resident births rivaling those of residents. Entry vetting has since tightened, most recently through the EVS-TAP program for the Chinese market. How the new order applies to the CNMI’s distinct entry channels, including the Guam-CNMI visa waiver program, is an implementation question the order leaves to the Secretaries, whose forthcoming rules will determine its local reach.
