In Mexico, birthright citizenship gives a Haitian family a new future

Mexico, like the United States, grants citizenship to children born on its soil, a point at the centre of a wider debate as US President Donald Trump pushes to end birthright citizenship for some children born in America. In Tijuana, near the US border, Haitian migrant Vivianne Petit Frere says that policy has shaped her family’s future after her granddaughter was born in Mexico two years ago and became a Mexican citizen automatically.

Petit Frere, who fled Haiti in 2019 and had once hoped to settle in the US, now runs a Haitian restaurant in Tijuana and is building a life in Mexico. Her story reflects how birthright citizenship has affected migrant families in the region, even as Trump insists the US is the only country that follows the practice.

Petit Frere’s brightly painted restaurant, Lakou Lakay, stands a few blocks from the towering US border wall in Tijuana. The name means “home” in Haitian Creole and, for her, reflects her family’s growing roots in Mexico. Like the US, Mexico gives citizenship to children born within its borders.

Trump has said the US is alone in doing so as he seeks to deny birthright citizenship to children whose parents are living in the country illegally or have temporary legal status. The US Supreme Court is expected to weigh in soon on the constitutionality of his order on birthright citizenship, which he signed on January 20, 2025, the first day of his second term, amid a broader immigration crackdown by his Republican administration.

In April, Trump wrote on Truth Social: “We are the only Country in the World STUPID enough to allow Birthright’ Citizenship!” In fact, about three dozen countries, mostly in the Americas, automatically grant citizenship to children born on their territory, including Canada, Honduras, Brazil, Argentina, Venezuela and Mexico.

Petit Frere said she left Haiti in 2019, travelled from Brazil and crossed the Panamanian jungle to reach Mexico in the hope of eventually joining relatives in Florida. She said she soon realised that dream would not happen, while Mexico gave her an opportunity to stay.

Her restaurant now serves traditional Haitian food such as fish with plantains, and rice and beans. Signs on the walls in Spanish, English and Creole show that she sees it as more than a place to eat. “Every dish tells a story, every detail connects cultures,” one sign says. “We aim to promote an authentic cultural exchanges between two peoples with similar historical roots yet where Haitian identity proudly blossoms on Mexican soil.”

In a little over five years in Tijuana, Petit Frere has built a successful business, become fluent in Spanish and started studying for a degree in social work. She has also welcomed the first Mexican-born child in her family, her granddaughter Alexca. There are no figures on how many children born to non-citizens have received Mexican birthright citizenship. Tens of thousands of Haitians live in Mexico, and in 2021, when Haitian migration to Mexico rose sharply, at least 10 per cent of arriving Haitian women were pregnant, according to the United Nations’ Organisation for Migration.

In the US, birthright citizenship was written into law after the Civil War through the 14th Amendment, partly to ensure citizenship for former slaves. It was later extended to immigrants’ children in the late 1800s, when the Supreme Court ruled that almost anyone born in the US is a citizen, regardless of their parents’ legal status. Legal historians say the practice goes back to the 1600s and 1700s, when European rulers encouraged migration to American colonies while also wanting children born abroad to keep European citizenship.

“You’re a citizen as long as you’re born within the domain of the king, of the monarch,” said Csar Cuauhtmoc Garcia Hernandez, a law professor at Ohio State University. “But the legal tie between the home country in Europe and the settlers remained strong through the promise of birthright citizenship.”

The Dominican Republic moved in the opposite direction. In 2007, the Dominican Electoral Council officially ordered that children born to parents without legal status be denied citizenship. Six years later, a Dominican court applied the decision retroactively to 1929. More than a decade later, as many as 130,000 people remained stateless despite a 2014 law meant to reverse the court ruling after strong international criticism, according to the Centre for Migration Studies of New York. The law now affects the next generation, which remains vulnerable to deportation.

Petit Frere was born in French Saint Martin, a Caribbean island that does not offer automatic birthright citizenship. She said she and her Haitian mother were deported to Haiti when she was six. Years later, after she had moved to Tijuana, her teenage daughter arrived from Haiti to reunite with her and was nearly five months pregnant. Petit Frere said she had been a teenage mother herself and had hoped her daughter would have a different life.

But she said Alexca, now a toddler, has changed her outlook. Petit Frere said she was grateful her granddaughter was born in Mexico rather than Haiti, where gang violence has left more than one in 10 people homeless. She also said a Mexican passport would make travel easier, as travelling on a Haitian passport is very difficult because few countries allow visa-free entry. “As a Mexican citizen, she will have more opportunities,” Petit Frere said.

She said the same has been true for her three nieces, who were born in Brazil and automatically became citizens there. Petit Frere added that she and her daughter already had permanent residency in Mexico before Alexca was born, but many other Haitian parents in Tijuana did not. Mexico allows parents of children with birthright citizenship to become permanent residents.

“There are a lot of children in Tijuana who are 6, 7, 8 years old now who are Mexican and their parents who are Haitian did not have legal status but now have become permanent residents because their children were born here,” she said.

Petit Frere said she has begun the process of becoming a Mexican citizen, which she said would make it easier to expand her business. She is also a community organiser with the Haitian Bridge Alliance and works with the Haitian migrant community. She said she hopes to study international migration as well, possibly through a US university.

Her story brings together the wider political debate and the everyday realities of migrant families: a Haitian woman who once chased the American dream has built a business and a family in Mexico, where her granddaughter’s citizenship has opened up a more secure future. “The children of immigrants are proving to be the most outstanding in the world,” Petit Frere said. Trump’s efforts to limit birthright citizenship “could just be out of jealousy.”

With PTI Inputs

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