Democratic California Rep. Maxine Waters suggested that President Donald Trump investigate and potentially deport first lady Melania Trump during an anti-DOGE protest in Los Angeles over the weekend.
“When he [Trump] talks about birthright, and he’s going to undo the fact that the Constitution allows those who are born here, even if the parents are undocumented, they have a right to stay in America. If he wants to start looking so closely to find those who were born here and their parents were undocumented, maybe he ought to first look at Melania,” Waters was seen saying from the stage of a rally in Los Angeles, per a number of videos posted online.
“We don’t know whether or not her parents were documented. And maybe we better just take a look,” the aged congresswoman continued. Melania Trump was born in the former Yugoslavia and became a U.S. citizen in 2006, according to official government biographies of the first lady. She is the first first lady in U.S. history to become a naturalized citizen and the second to be born outside the United States, following Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams, the wife of President John Quincy Adams, who was born in London in 1775, Fox News reported.
According to a 2018 report by The New York Times, after obtaining her own citizenship, the First Lady sponsored her parents—both originally from what is now Slovenia—for green cards and later citizenship. Viktor and Amalija Knavs officially became U.S. citizens that same year. Amalija Knavs passed away in 2024, while her father, Viktor, has recently been seen attending public events with the Trump family, including sitting next to Barron Trump during the inauguration.
Waters was referring to President Donald Trump signing an executive order on his first day in office that bans birthright citizenship. The executive order works to clarify the 14th Amendment, which states, “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 Trump executive order aims to limit birthright citizenship by excluding individuals born to illegal immigrant parents or those in the U.S. on temporary non-immigrant visas. The order has since been challenged in federal court.