United States President Donald Trump on Wednesday shared on social media the transcript of remarks made by an American political commentator about birthright citizenship in the US that described India as being among “hellhole” countries.
The remarks were made by Michael Savage, an author and political commentator, on US-based TV channel Newsmax after hearings in the US Supreme Court about the case pertaining to birthright citizenship.
Birthright citizenship is the automatic acquisition of nationality by a child born within a country’s territory, regardless of their parents’ citizenship or immigration status.
On Thursday, in response to a question about Trump’s post, the Ministry of External Affairs Spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said: “We have seen some reports. That’s where I leave it.” Later in the day, NDTV quoted Christopher Elms, the spokesperson for the US Embassy in New Delhi as saying that Trump described India as a “great country with a very good friend of mine at the top”.
Trump has long been a proponent of ending birthright citizenship in the US. In January 2025, Trump signed an executive order to stop automatically granting citizenship to those born in the US in specific scenarios.
Legal consensus, however, broadly holds that the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution guarantees birthright citizenship. The matter is being heard by the Supreme Court.
Savage said that the arguments should not be conducted “in the abstract of a courtroom” as the demand to revoke birthright citizenship was “really not about law” but rather about public opinion.
The political commentator said that the US Constitution, which guarantees birthright citizenship, had been written before air travel, and questioned “how relevant are some of these arguments when people are coming here by airplane in the ninth month of their pregnancy”.
“A baby here becomes an instant citizen, and then they bring the entire family in from China or India or some other hellhole on the planet,” Savage claimed. “You don’t have to go far to see that. English is not spoken here anymore.”
He added that “there’s almost no loyalty to this country amongst the immigrant class coming in today, which was not always the case”. The immigrants are “not like the European Americans of today and their ancestors”, Savage added.
Savage argued that a referendum must be held to determine if birthright citizenship should continue.
“Our nation is being overrun with Chinese coming here just to drop a baby on our shore then bring in the entire family,” he said. “How about some common sense in a bankrupt nation?”
Savage alleged that American Civil Liberties Union Attorney Cecillia Wang was “pushing to destroy our national identity, turn us into a colony of China, but it’s not limited to China, it’s also India”. The American Civil Liberties Union is a non-profit civil rights organisation.
Savage added: “I used to be a great supporter of Indians in India until I opened my eyes up to what’s going on here.”
He said that white men “need not apply” for jobs in California, “never mind in high tech” as “you’re not getting a job at high tech in California” despite “what your qualifications are”.
“Your chances are nil,” he added. “You have to be from India or China because almost all the internal mechanisms are set up to [be] run by Indians and Chinese.”
Trump against birthright citizenship
On January 21, 2025, Trump directed federal agencies to refuse to recognise citizenship for children who were born in the country to mothers who are in the country illegally or are there legally on temporary visas, if the father is not a US citizen or a green card holder.
A green card, officially known as a Permanent Resident Card, allows an individual to stay and work permanently in the US.
The executive order would have denied citizenship to children who are born on US soil starting 30 days from the order, if at least one parent is not a United States citizen or a lawful permanent resident.
The executive order had been challenged in court by 22 states in the US.
Three days after Trump signed the order, a lower court temporarily blocked it and described it as “blatantly unconstitutional”.
On April 1, Trump attended the hearing in the Supreme Court, where the matter is now being heard, becoming the first sitting US president to attend such a session.
“We are the only country in the world stupid enough to allow ‘birthright’ citizenship!” Trump said on social media that day.
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