Watchdog: 22 Blue States Join Secret Anti-Trump Resistance Pact

State attorneys general of nearly half the country have signed a secret resistance pact against a key facet of President Donald Trump’s immigration policy, according to The Heritage Foundation’s Oversight Project.

“Of all the things in the world they could have picked — gas, groceries, protecting minorities, making sure kids can get their genitals chopped off, whatever else they claim is their top priority — instead, it’s birthright citizenship,” Mike Howell, executive director of The Oversight Project, told The Federalist. “It shows that the border policies were always political.”

Twenty-two top attorneys in Democrat states, alongside the lead attorneys of San Francisco and Washington, D.C., signed a “common interest agreement” beginning on Nov. 8 — just three days after Trump defeated former Vice President Kamala Harris in a landslide victory. The pact took effect on Nov. 14.

“The Parties have agreed that they have a common interest in developing potential litigation to challenge executive action relating to ending or curtailing birthright citizenship,” the pact reads. 

Trump signed an executive order on his first day in office titled “Protecting The Meaning and Value of American Citizenship.” The order directed the federal government not to recognize “birthright citizenship” as granting citizenship to everyone born in America. “The Fourteenth Amendment has always excluded from birthright citizenship persons who were born in the United States but not ‘subject to the jurisdiction thereof,’” the order reads.

The attorneys general of California, Colorado, Connecticut, D.C., Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Massachusetts, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, Nevada, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington, New Mexico, Wisconsin, Maine, and North Carolina — along with the deputy attorney general of Arizona and the city attorney of San Francisco — agreed to resist any executive measure limiting birthright citizenship.

“They want to cement the gains of the Biden border crisis by turning as many children of the illegals into voting citizens as possible,” Howell said. “That was their reaction after the election — not to change policies, or to adapt, or to recognize it got blown out — but to be like, ‘Oh crap, we’re losing now. We really need these new illegal alien voters via birthright.’”

Libs of TikTok replied to news of the secret pact, pointing out the misplaced priorities of the Democrat signers. “Instead of fixing gas prices, groceries, or public safety, Democrats’ top priority was ensuring that children of illegal aliens from the Biden Border Crisis could become future voters.”

Howell said the Oversight Project sought the document from various states, which stonewalled requests with “claims of privilege and other FOIA exemptions.” But eventually, the group got the pact from North Carolina.

“Some were fighting to keep it secret,” Howell said. “I have no doubt that a lot of the AGs are very upset that North Carolina turned this over.” 

A common interest agreement is not unusual when groups want to band together legally, according to Howell. “What is unusual is the scale of it and the political nature of it,” he said. He also said Democrat officials likely did not take the initiative to sign the pact on their own.

“I absolutely doubt half of the country’s attorneys general had the same idea to commit political suicide at the same time,” Howell said. “Someone made the Kool-Aid that all these AGs drank.” 

When immigration skyrocketed under former President Joe Biden, states like Texas had to pick up the slack — and are finally receiving federal assistance under Trump’s leadership, as The Federalist previously reported. Meanwhile, a network of federal agencies and nongovernmental organizations had been working to facilitate illegal immigration. For example, the Oversight Project recently revealed that the Mexican consulate in Tucson, Arizona, was working with an NGO that coached illegals to lie to law enforcement.

Logan Washburn is a staff writer covering election integrity. He is a spring 2025 fellow of The College Fix. He graduated from Hillsdale College, served as Christopher Rufo’s editorial assistant, and has bylines in The Wall Street Journal, The Tennessean, and The Daily Caller. Logan is from Central Oregon but now lives in rural Michigan.