Texas denies birth certificates to U.S.-born kids of immigrants, wants feds to butt out

Texas is refusing to issue birth certificates to immigrant kids, wants feds to stay out of it

(Image credit: CC by: Thomas Hawk)

published 23 July 2015

On Wednesday, the Texas Department of State Health Services and state's attorney general asked a federal court in Austin to throw out a lawsuit by 19 undocumented immigrants from Mexico and Central America who say that the state won't issue birth certificates for their U.S.-born children.

Under the 14th Amendment, all people born in the U.S. are citizens, but Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton argues that under the 11th Amendment, Texas has sovereign immunity and the federal government can't interfere because every state has the "power to control the circumstances under which it will provide copies of birth certificates." The plaintiffs, in their May lawsuit, argue that Texas is effectively enforcing immigration law, which is the responsibility of the federal government.

The point of contention is which documents the Texas Vital Statistics Unit, part of the DHSH, accepts from parents seeking birth certificates for their Texas-born children. Plaintiffs who have been in the U.S. for a decade or more say the agency accepted ID cards, called matriculas, issued by the Mexican consulate, when they obtained birth certificates for their older children. Without announcing any changes, Texas stopped accepting those cards in about 2013, the lawsuit claims. A DHSH spokesman tells The Associated Press that his office has "never accepted the matricula consular as adequate identification."

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Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.

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