The U.S. Supreme Court will hear a case Thursday that may determine if babies born to undocumented parents in Idaho will be granted fewer rights than babies born to its neighbors to the West.

When President Donald Trump signed an executive order to limit birthright citizenship — a right guaranteed in the 14th Amendment — several states quickly challenged its constitutionality. A federal judge in Washington state was the first to place a nationwide injunction on the order, which blocks it from going into effect while it’s being litigated.

Supreme Court justices will hear arguments on whether judges’ injunctions can apply nationwide; they will not be weighing in on the constitutionality of the order itself.

Washington state Attorney General Nick Brown, leading a group of attorneys general from Oregon, Arizona, and Illinois, wrote in a filing to the high court that “nationwide relief was clearly appropriate” given the nature of the order and “the costs and confusion that a patchwork rule of citizenship would impose on them.”

Brown highlighted in the filing that major cities in the plaintiffs’ states border states that have not blocked the order, including Spokane, Washington, which is about a 20-minute drive from Post Falls, Idaho.

“It is hardly ‘speculative’ to suggest confusion will proliferate if babies’ citizenship turns on which hospital they are born in along these borders,” Brown wrote.

The Department of Justice is still defending the constitutionality of the order in lower courts, but in the meantime is asking the nation’s high court to limit the injunctions to either just individuals involved in the cases in the suing states or to just those states. There are two other cases consolidated into the Trump v. CASA case; one brought by immigrants’ rights groups and several pregnant women in Maryland; and another case out of a Massachusetts court brought by a group of 18 states, the District of Columbia, and San Francisco.

Then-U.S. Acting Solicitor General Sarah Harris wrote to the court that “universal injunctions transgress constitutional limits on courts’ powers.”

“Universal injunctions have reached epidemic proportions since the start of the current Administration,” Harris wrote. “... District courts have issued more universal injunctions and (temporary restraining orders) during February 2025 alone than through the first three years of the Biden Administration.”

The order, issued Jan. 20, would mean citizenship would not be granted to infants born in the U.S. to a mother who was in the country illegally and the father was either not a citizen or lawful permanent resident or to babies whose mothers were in the country legally but temporarily. The order would not be retroactive, and would apply to babies born after 30 days from the date the order went into effect.

Washington, with Oregon, Illinois and Arizona, challenged the order, and two days later Seattle federal Judge John Coughenour placed a nationwide injunction, stopping it from being enforced, the Seattle Times reported.

The Ronald Reagan-appointed judge called the order “blatantly unconstitutional” in placing the nationwide injunction, according to the Seattle Times. Other states followed, and in all, 22 states were represented in cases challenging the order.

Brown in his court filing noted that four district courts from three different circuits found the order unlawful, and three circuit courts have declined to remove the injunctions.

He noted that nationwide injunctions are not always appropriate, but because of the impact of differing rules and rights among states, it should apply for this case.

“Restricting nationwide relief would be particularly inappropriate here, as it would defeat a central guarantee of the Fourteenth Amendment to create a uniform, national rule for citizenship,” Brown said. “If any injunction warranted a nationwide scope, it is this one.”

The Supreme Court does not livestream hearings, but live audio of oral arguments will be available online at supremecourt.gov/oral_arguments.