Amendment requires federal judges to be born as U.S. citizens.
H.J.Res. 219 — Proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States to require a Judge to be a natural born citizen of the United States. · Filed by Scott Perry (R-PA) · Introduced Oct 15, 2026 · Referred to committee
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What it does
This proposal would change the Constitution. It would require all federal judges to be born as U.S. citizens. If enough states approve it, judges who became citizens later would leave office. This would happen two years after approval. After that, people who became citizens later could never be federal judges.
Who it affects
People who became citizens later would be banned from being federal judges. Judges who became citizens later would lose their jobs. Courts would have empty seats to fill.
One thing to notice
The proposal does not say what born as a U.S. citizen means. Courts have disagreed about this term before.
From the analysis of the bill text, linked under Primary records below.
Where it stands
- Oct 15, 2026 — Introduced · Congress.gov: “Introduced in House”
- Oct 15, 2026 — Referred to House Committee on the Judiciary · Congress.gov: “Referred to the House Committee on the Judiciary”
Dates and quoted wording are Congress.gov's action record; the timeline shows status changes, not every procedural step.
Words to know
- federal judges — Judges who work in courts run by the U.S. government.
- born as a U.S. citizen — A person who was a U.S. citizen from birth, not someone who became one later.
- became citizens later — A person born in another country who went through legal steps to become a U.S. citizen.
- Constitution — The main set of rules for how the U.S. government works.
How this was measured
Analysis — Quorum's AI read the bill text published by Congress.gov (1,351 characters) on Oct 30, 2026. Section numbers in the findings refer to that text, linked below; transparency and hidden-provision scores are compared against the median of 16,605 analysed bills.
Status and sponsors — Congress.gov's bill record — actions, committee referrals and cosponsors — loaded nightly. The timeline shows status changes, not every procedural action.
As of — page rendered 2026-10-30.
“Amendment requires federal judges to be born as U.S. citizens.” QuorumCivic. https://share.quorumcivic.app/bill/119/hjres219/simple Report an error
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