Peloni
Mark opens his Saturday, December 20 show by forcefully arguing that birthright citizenship for children of illegal immigrants is unconstitutional and that the Supreme Court should reconsider the long-standing interpretations of the 14th Amendment. While expressing concern that the SCOTUS justices may be manipulated by Leftist activist threats and harassment, Mark makes the case that the core argument of this case should be seen to be understood to be both historical and textual.
Explaining that 14th Amendment’s Citizenship Clause was never intended to apply to either legal or illegal immigration, Mark notes that this amendment was narrowly focused on the aftermath of the Civil War. In fact, he argues that its purpose was actually intended to ensure that the freed Black Americans and their children were recognized as full citizens, and guaranteed equal protections under the law. Immigration issues were never remotely included in any part of congressional debates or deliberations leading up to the adoption of this amendment, and were instead fashioned around the headlines of the day which included the ever present turmoil which comprised the Reconstruction period in America.
In support this claim, Mark cites earlier laws demonstrating that the concept of illegal immigration both existed and was regulated well before the 14th Amendment, and that these are the legal foundations on which SCOTUS should focus its inquiries on this subject. Both colonial and early state laws allowed for the removal/deportation of non-residents/impoverished foreigners. Of more relevance than this, Mark emphasizes the relevance of the Nationality Act of 1790. This law required affirmative steps for naturalization to be secured. These steps included residency, good character, court application, and an oath of allegiance, demonstrating that citizenship was not automatic for parents nor their children. This demonstrates that that mere physical presence or childbirth on U.S. soil was never sufficient enough to confer citizenship to foreigners and/or their offspring.
Mark next turns his attention to the Civil Rights Act of 1866. This law declared citizens to be those born in the United States “not subject to any foreign power.” Mark explains that this language, which was later echoed in the 14th Amendment, was clearly intended to refer to political and legal allegiance, and not geographic presence. Key framers of the amendment, including Senators Jacob Howard and Lyman Trumbull, explicitly stated that “subject to the jurisdiction” meant owing allegiance only to the United States. Illegal aliens, by definition, remain subject to a foreign sovereign.
Mark goes on to reject the spurious claim that historical silence on illegal immigration would provide support for birthright citizenship being applied universally. He also dismisses the 1898 Supreme Court case which is so often cited in support of birthright citizenship, explaining that it involved children of legal residents and is either irrelevant or wrongly decided. In concluding this segment Mark challenges that the act of extending birthright citizenship to children of illegal immigrants would require distorting constitutional text and rewriting history. Doing so would amount to judicial activism rather than faithful interpretation of the constitution.
In the second segment, Mark talks with Heritage Foundation’s Hans Von Spakovsky who explains that the modern view of the 14th Amendment contradicts the first 70 years of interpretations of this amendment. Raising the example of an American Indian who failed while using the 14th Amendment to support his claim to American citizenship, Spakovsky explains that SCOTUS rejected this interpretation due to the primary allegiance was to a non-US govt, ie the govt of American Indian’s tribe. Explaining further, the 1924 law which extended American citizenship to American Indians would have been irrelevant and unnecessary if the modern claims of the 14th Amendment had been accepted at the time, demonstrating the modern revisionism which has taken place to manipulate the meaning of this amendment over the past century.
In his third segment, Mark talks with Sen. Ted Cruz about the strait forward nature of the case before SCOTUS, and that the political environment is what complicates the case. Cruz describes the brief which he forwarded to SCOTUS in support of rejecting the claim of birthright citizenship for illegal aliens.
Mark opens his Sunday, December 22 show with a sweeping historical and ideological review of America’s founding principles, the relationship between Christianity and Judaism, and the roots of the Republican Party, from which he culminates a call to political and cultural action today.
Mark begins by reviewing the American identity as described in history during the founding of the United States. He reminds us that the Founders were Christians of various denominations who, despite theological differences, shared a belief in a Creator, natural law, and natural rights rooted in Judeo-Christian values. The Declaration’s references to God, sovereignty, and eternal truths provide evidence of this shared belief and it was central to the nation’s origins. Highlighting George Washington’s 1790 letter to the Hebrew Congregation of Newport, it affirmed that the American government gives “to bigotry no sanction” and “to persecution no assistance,” while promising liberty of conscience as a natural right to Jews and all faiths, and it did so not a favor from the majority.
Mark emphasizes the cooperation and mutual respect which existed between Christians and Jews in period of early America. Citing Thomas Jefferson’s Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, which dismantled discriminatory laws against religious minorities, Mark notes that this act laid the groundwork for the First Amendment. He also reminds us of the symbolic moments of unity, such as included the Jewish and Christian clergy celebrating the Constitution in unison together, as well as vital contributions to the American cause, notably that of Haym Salomon’s financial support of the Revolutionary War. The Founders were deeply familiar with the Hebrew Bible and admired ancient Israel which reinforced a shared moral foundation.
Mark then turns to the origins of the Republican Party as an explicitly anti-slavery coalition formed in the 1850s. Mark makes the claim that the sole founding purpose was to eliminate slavery, culminating in Abraham Lincoln’s election and the Civil War. While quoting Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address at length to show the moral and religious gravity with which slavery and the war were understood, Mark ignores the exchange of letters between Lincoln and Horace Greeley. In this dialogue Lincoln made it clear that his goals were directed towards the preservation of the Union, not the freeing of the slaves, something which was clearly supported by the fact that the slaves in the non-rebellious states had not declared free with the Emancipation proclamation.
Nonetheless, Mark goes on to credit Republicans with advancing the core civil rights framework of the nation: the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments, early Civil Rights Acts, enforcement against the Ku Klux Klan, and later bipartisan civil rights legislation of the 20th century. In reviewing this history, Mark challenges that neither America nor the Republican Party is rooted in oppression.
Finally, while pivoting to the present, Mark warns that the modern ideologies of Marxism, Islamism, and neo-fascism are in the same moment attempting to undermine US history, American unity, and Judeo-Christian values. As the Democratic Party embraces these enemies of America’s traditions, history and values, they are actively attempting to defeat Americanism. So too is the dangerous “cancer” of the Woke Right are simultaneously threatening to divide the Republican Party from within. Mark calls on constitutional conservatives, Republicans, and ordinary Americans to support civil liberties, oppose antisemitism and religious persecution, and by doing so, actively preserve the moral and historical foundations on which the United States was founded.
In his second segment, Mark talks with Dr. Zuhdi Jasser of American Islamic Forum for Democracy about the threats of political Islam which is rising in the US. Jasser explains that the way to win the war against Islamism is to recognize it and supporting American core values. He also addresses the need to designate the Muslim Brotherhood while congressional leaders are failing to follow thru on this.
In his third segment, Mark talks with Joe Concha about Trump’s various policy moves and the Democrats ongoing vilification campaign.
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