DeSantis jokes he's ready to ‘welcome’ NY Times to pro-life movement after headline recognizing the 'unborn'
Gov. Ron DeSantis, R-Fla., joked it might be time for the pro-life movement to welcome the New York Times into the fold for a recent headline from the legacy media outlet that acknowledged the "unborn" as children.
"You know, I kind of feel like we have a lot of momentum, so there's this issue that the president has introduced, which I'm supportive of, to say the Constitution doesn't give birthright citizenship to people that are here illegally," DeSantis said Friday at the 52nd annual March for Life in Washington, D.C.
"But it's interesting. Not everyone likes that. And so, The New York Times had a hit piece going against this. And here was their headline, ‘Undocumented women ask: Will my unborn child be a citizen?’" he said.
"So The New York Times is admitting it's not just a clump of cells," DeSantis said. "Let's welcome the New York Times to the pro-life movement."
The New York Times piece, which ran on Tuesday, quoted illegal immigrants voicing their concern that their unborn children might not be recognized as citizens.
The piece was in response to President Donald Trump’s executive order on Monday saying that the children of illegal immigrants and those born to legal immigrants with temporary visas should not be recognized as citizens.
The executive order, which goes into effect Feb. 19, says that "it is the policy of the United States that no department or agency of the United States government shall issue documents recognizing United States citizenship, or accept documents issued by State, local, or other governments or authorities purporting to recognize United States citizenship, to persons: (1) when that person’s mother was unlawfully present in the United States and the person’s father was not a United States citizen or lawful permanent resident at the time of said person’s birth, or (2) when that person’s mother’s presence in the United States was lawful but temporary, and the person’s father was not a United States citizen or lawful permanent resident at the time of said person’s birth."
The New York Times article quotes the Citizenship Clause of the 14th Amendment which says that "all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside."
The piece goes on to say that the "provision has since been interpreted to apply to virtually all children born here, regardless of their parents’ status. But some immigration restrictionists believe that there is a legal ground for narrowing its scope."
In a statement to Fox News Digital, a New York Times spokesperson said of DeSantis' remarks, "Our newsroom covers abortion and immigration impartially as our recent coverage of President Trump's immigration executive order demonstrates, from the logistics of enlisting the military, to legal challenges, to tracking the demographics of who would be affected by deportations, as well as interviews with undocumented women who expect to give birth after the order goes into effect."
On Thursday, a federal judge in Seattle, U.S. District Judge John Coughenour, temporarily blocked Trump’s executive order, calling it "blatantly unconstitutional."