Following last week’s debacle when Donald Trump used the controversial term “anchor babies” to complain about Hispanic parents seeking to birth babies on American soil to gain citizenship while he excluded the growing numbers of Asian and even European immigrants who pay thousands of dollars to achieve similar results in what’s called “birth tourism,” presidential hopeful Jeb Bush has now clarified his own position on the topic. Bush was recently criticized by Asians and even Trump for implying that Asian people also engage in birth tourism.
During a visit to the U.S. border between Texas and Mexico, Bush stated, “What I was talking about was the specific case of fraud being committed where there’s organized efforts, and frankly it’s more related to Asian people coming into our country, having children in that organized effort, taking advantage of a noble concept with birthright citizenship.”
Bush’s comments come after the unveiling of Pew research data from 2010 which stated that of 340,000 babies born in 2008 to unauthorized immigrant parents in the U.S., Asian immigrants accounted for 36 percent of the total births. This is compared to the 31 percent that were born to Hispanic mothers.
In March of 2015, law enforcement authorities in Los Angeles raided a series of establishments that catered specifically to Chinese nationals who were engaging in “birth tourism.” According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, these mothers paid as much as $50K for packages designed to allow birth in the United States.
