President Donald Trump has claimed that birthright citizenship was intended solely for “children of slaves” during his address at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC). In his first month in office, Trump signed an executive order aiming to end birthright citizenship.

However, this policy was swiftly challenged in court and remains unresolved. Visibly frustrated by the legal obstacles, Trump argued that the constitutional clause was established only for the children of slaves “during a very difficult time in this country’s history.”

He also suggested that the constitutional law is outdated, having been created “many, many years ago.”

“I wish people would just understand that,”he said. “It wasn’t meant for people who escaped or invaded our country.”

Trump’s hardline stance on illegal immigration in the US has been characterised by increasingly inflammatory comments, where he has labelled them as criminals and rapists. He also took the opportunity to criticise former President Joe Biden, claiming that everything he touched “turned into s**t.”

His controversial rhetoric continued at CPAC, where he boasted about declaring an emergency at the southern border on his first day in office, which led to the deployment of active duty troops to “repel the invasion,” according to the 47th US President.

A potential Supreme Court battle was initiated on Wednesday night when a federal appeals court upheld a lower court’s decision to halt Trump’s executive order, reports The Mirror US.

The U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals has rejected an emergency plea from the Justice Department to lift a stay placed by a Seattle federal judge, which halted President Trump’s attempt to end birthright citizenship for certain children of immigrants. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and an immigrant rights group had already challenged the executive order in two other cases.

U.S. District Judge John C. Coughenour in Seattle, in a case filed by four states, accused the Trump administration of trying to bypass the Constitution.

“I’ve been on the bench for over four decades. I can’t remember another case where the question presented was as clear as this one is,” Coughenour told a Justice Department attorney. “This is a blatantly unconstitutional order.”

At least nine lawsuits have been filed to challenge the birthright citizenship decree, and Wednesday’s decision is likely to set the stage for a battle in the Supreme Court, which has a conservative majority of 6-3 among its justices.

A Texas law that forbade undocumented children from attending public schools was declared unlawful by the nation’s highest court in the 1982 decision of Plyler v. Doe, the most recent ruling on the subject of birthright citizenship.

The state argued that undocumented immigrants did not qualify as “persons within its jurisdiction” and thus were exempt from equal protection rights, but Justice William Brennan dismissed this argument in his judgement.