Current Events

The ACLU asks a court to block Trump's citizenship order

Filed August 11 in New Hampshire, the request targets an order that stops recognizing citizenship for children linked to terror groups, foreign diplomats, birth tourism, or certain territories, with agencies required to issue public guidance on its implementation by September 5.

5 min read2026-08-13

Citizenship

Trump's order stops recognizing citizenship for four categories of U.S.-born children¹

President Trump's August 6 executive order invokes the Supreme Court's June 30 ruling in Trump v. Barbara, which upheld birthright citizenship.¹ It directs the State Department, the Justice Department, the Department of Homeland Security, and the Social Security Administration to stop recognizing citizenship for U.S.-born children in four circumstances.¹ Two turn on the parents: a parent tied to a designated Foreign Terrorist Organization, or a parent who is a foreign-government employee with diplomatic immunity.¹ The other two turn on the birth itself.¹ One is arranged through what the order calls a "commercial transaction" bringing the mother into the country to give birth.¹ The other is a birth in a territory where federal law does not itself confer citizenship.¹ The order also gives agencies until September 5, 30 days from the signing, to issue public guidance on how they will carry it out.¹ On August 11, the ACLU and allied groups asked a federal judge in Concord, New Hampshire, to block the order.² As of Wednesday, August 12, no ruling had come.² "President Trump may not like the fact that birthright citizenship is a constitutional right," the ACLU's Cody Wofsy said.² The group expects the order to be struck down in court.³

Gun policy

An NFA registration injunction takes effect, and unregistered silencer transfers begin⁴

A federal injunction against enforcing National Firearms Act registration requirements took effect at the boundary of August 12 and 13, and gun owners moved immediately.⁴ At 12:01 a.m., Gun Owners of America and Silencer Shop completed the first transfers of unregistered suppressors, to Brandon Herrera, the Republican nominee for Texas's 23rd congressional district, and Wes Virdell, a Republican Texas state representative.⁵ Neither transfer used a Form 4, ATF approval, or an entry in the federal firearms registry.⁵ Judge James Wesley Hendrix's August 5 final judgment in Silencer Shop Foundation v. ATF permanently barred enforcement of the NFA's registration, application, and transfer-approval requirements.⁴ The covered categories are silencers, short-barreled rifles, short-barreled shotguns, and, for one set of plaintiffs, the category the law calls "any other weapons."⁴ Hendrix reasoned that the requirements can no longer rest on Congress's taxing power now that the One Big Beautiful Bill Act zeroed out the underlying transfer and making taxes.⁴ Neither the Commerce Clause nor the Necessary and Proper Clause was ever invoked to support them, he wrote.⁴ He stayed his own order for seven days "to allow the defendants to seek relief, if any, at the appellate level."⁴ That stay ran from the August 5 entry and expired at the moment the transfers happened.⁴ The injunction reaches only the plaintiffs before the court, not gun owners generally: 15 states, several gun-rights groups, and named commercial and individual plaintiffs, plus their current and future customers.⁴ Hendrix declined to issue the nationwide "blanket ban" the lead plaintiffs sought, citing the Supreme Court's limits on universal injunctions in Trump v. CASA.⁴ The Department of Justice did not appeal before the deadline.⁵⁶

Cyber policy

Trump authorizes vetted companies to run offensive cyber operations against foreign criminals⁷

A presidential memorandum signed August 12 creates a formal channel for private companies to fight cybercrime with the government's blessing.⁷ The Attorney General and the Secretary of Homeland Security may jointly vet and authorize "Participating Companies" to conduct offensive operations against foreign cyber-enabled transnational criminal organizations.⁷ The memorandum calls this work Cyber Surveillance Operations and Cyber Effects Operations.⁷ Authorized companies must post a $1 million bond, and joint DOJ-DHS program directors must sign off on each operation. The program reports annually to the National Cyber Director.⁷ Ari Redbord, head of government affairs at the blockchain intelligence firm TRM Labs, told Bloomberg the arrangement amounts to "cyber letters of marque," the historical term for government licenses that let private ships raid an enemy's shipping.⁸ The memorandum's authorization reaches past monitoring into "Cyber Effects Operations," offensive activity the government has historically kept in its own hands, now put in the hands of bonded private companies under federal sign-off.⁷

Capital punishment

Tennessee, Alabama, and Oklahoma are set to execute three men the same day, last done in 2010⁹

Three states scheduled executions for August 13.⁹ Tennessee's was set for Anthony Darrell Hines, 66, at 10 a.m. at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution, and Oklahoma's for Carlos Cuesta-Rodriguez, 70.¹⁰⁹ Alabama's covers Jeremy Williams, 42, inside the 30-hour window Governor Kay Ivey set, from midnight to 6 a.m. the next day.¹¹ The last time three executions were carried out on the same day was January 7, 2010, when Louisiana, Ohio, and Texas each put an inmate to death.⁹ The three 2026 dates were set independently, by separate courts and governors months apart, and converged on the calendar by coincidence rather than coordination.¹¹¹²¹⁰ Alabama's Supreme Court authorized Williams's execution on June 16, Oklahoma's Court of Criminal Appeals set Cuesta-Rodriguez's date on its own timeline in early June, and Tennessee's had been public since mid-July.¹¹¹²¹⁰ Ivey said she had "no plans to grant clemency" but retained the constitutional authority to issue a reprieve before the execution.¹¹ Richard Chancey, the Russell County district attorney who prosecuted Williams, said, "It's just a level of evil."⁹ A previous attempt at three same-day executions, in 2018, saw only one go forward after Texas and Alabama cases ran into complications.⁹

Trump's order stops recognizing citizenship for four categories of U.S.-born children1

An NFA registration injunction takes effect, and unregistered silencer transfers begin4

Trump authorizes vetted companies to run offensive cyber operations against foreign criminals7

Tennessee, Alabama, and Oklahoma are set to execute three men the same day, last done in 20109

Sources

Trump's order stops recognizing citizenship for four categories of U.S.-born children¹

An NFA registration injunction takes effect, and unregistered silencer transfers begin⁴

Trump authorizes vetted companies to run offensive cyber operations against foreign criminals⁷

Tennessee, Alabama, and Oklahoma are set to execute three men the same day, last done in 2010⁹