Undocumented and pregnant, an NC woman fears Trump’s attack on birthright citizenship | Opinion

Twenty years ago, she entered the United States from Mexico illegally in search of a better life.

She found it in North Carolina. At 35, she is a farmworker living in Fayetteville and married to another undocumented immigrant. They have two children — girls 11 and 13.

But now this woman, who asked to be identified only as Andrea, has more than her and her husband’s status to worry about.

She’s pregnant, and the president of the United States wants her third child to be born without a country.

President Trump declared this week by executive order that the son Andrea is due to deliver in August will inherit his parents’ undocumented status. The order, effective Feb. 19, would end birthright citizenship for children born to undocumented immigrants.

Speaking in Spanish through an interpreter from the Latino advocacy group El Pueblo, Andrea said, “I had heard about his plans to do this under his last administration, but then it happened under this new administration and the reality has been really hard to face.”

A federal judge on Thursday temporarily blocked Trump’s attempt to end birthright citizenship as guaranteed by the 14th Amendment, but that hasn’t calmed Andrea’s anxiety.

She has long lived in the shadows of a broken immigration system that does not provide a realistic path to citizenship for longtime undocumented immigrants.

Now she not only faces Trump’s stepped up deportation efforts, but also the possibility that her next child will not have the rights and opportunities of her two daughters, who were born in the U.S.

Her daughters, she said, are good students who are “already planning a future of growing up to be somebody in the United States.” But her next child may not have that opportunity or hope. He should have the right “to claim the place where he was born as the place he will live in,” she said.

Andrea is receiving prenatal care and she knows what hospital she will give birth in, but now she fears that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents may come to the hospital to take away her or her husband. In that case, there would be no one to care for their daughters. They would have to all return to a Mexico she left long ago and that her children have never known.

And she is uncertain about what will be the status of her newborn child. “If this law goes into effect,” she said, “I don’t know what the process is. I don’t know if I can go pick up my child’s birth certificate. I don’t know what nationality will be recorded on that birth certificate.”

Andrea wishes that she and other undocumented immigrants would be offered a way out of living with such vulnerability and uncertainty.

“I believe that the best way would be to have a pathway to citizenship,” she said, “but I know that is not realistic right now. I think having at least a work permit could help the community to be here without fear and work peacefully.”

El Pueblo estimates that there are at least 300,000 undocumented immigrants living in North Carolina. They are here to fill a strong demand for their labor. Many of them pay taxes that support public benefits they are ineligible to receive.

Andrea said the government should give legal status to those who are here to do hard jobs instead of trying to banish them and their children. “I would like to see an administration that values justice, equality, fairness and respect for human rights,” she said, “an administration that wouldn’t attack immigrants, but rather find ways for all of us to live and work peacefully in harmony.”

Andrea’s work includes picking blueberries, strawberries and sweet potatoes. She is here because farmers need her labor. She will continue to pick and carry produce during her pregnancy because she cannot afford not to. She is not a threat to the nation; she helps to feed it. The child she will deliver here will be a citizen of the United States under the Constitution.

Trump has the power to frighten Andrea. He does not have the power to revoke what the Constitution provides.

This story was originally published January 26, 2025 at 5:00 AM.