Justice Brett Kavanaugh rejected the majority's constitutional ruling on birthright citizenship but joined the result because he concluded that a federal law broadly grants birthright citizenship, meaning a future Congress could restrict it by changing that law.
Notes on verification
Multiple independent, high-quality sources (CBS News, NPR, Constitution Center, Slate, SCOTUSblog) consistently describe Kavanaugh's separate statutory rationale, matching all specifics of the claim including citation to 8 U.S.C. §1401(a) and the resulting 5-4/6-3 split. [tier=silver indep_score=0.875 clusters=4 claim_tier=exceptional]
Sources
- Supreme Court upholds birthright citizenship, rejecting Trump’s proposed limits (seed:politics_and_current_events)
- https://constitutioncenter.org/blog/supreme-court-strikes-down-trumps-birthright-citizenship-executive-order-in-landmark-decision (corroboration)
- https://www.cbsnews.com/news/supreme-court-birthright-citizenship-trump-decision/ (corroboration)
- https://www.npr.org/2026/06/30/nx-s1-5839358/birthright-citizenship-decision-scotus-trump (corroboration)
- https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2026/06/brett-kavanaugh-trump-attack-birthright-citizenship-fail.html (corroboration)