The Supreme Court on Tuesday upheld birthright citizenship—the principle that children born in the United States are automatically U.S. citizens regardless of their parents’ immigration status—rejecting an executive order by President Donald Trump that sought to undo that longstanding constitutional principle. Chief Justice John Roberts, writing for a 6-3 majority, called citizenship “the right to have rights,” and wrote that the Framers of the Fourteenth Amendment extended that promise to “every free-born person in this land.”
While the ruling settled a question that had been pending since Trump signed the order on the first day of his second term, the economic case for birthright citizenship was never really in doubt. What do Steve Jobs, Henry Ford, William Boeing and many other founders have in common, besides being on the Fortune 500 list? They’re all the American-born children of immigrants.
Apple was co-founded by Steve Jobs, who born in San Francisco to a Syrian immigrant father and later adopted. In addition to redefining what the computer and cellphone industry means today, Jobs led Apple to become a major economic driver in the country. Apple’s most recent fiscal year ended with $416 billion in revenue, making it one of the most valuable companies on earth.
Costco’s Jim Sinegal was the son of Canadian immigrants whose own family had emigrated from Romania. In fiscal year 2025, Costco posted $269.9 billion in net sales. While he didn’t technically found McDonald’s, Ray Kroc, son of Czech immigrants who settled in Illinois, turned it into the most recognized fast food brand on earth. New York-born Marc Randolph, Netflix‘s co-founder and original CEO, is the son of an Austrian immigrant.
William Boeing, born in Detroit to a German immigrant father, founded the company that still manufactures more commercial aircraft than any other in the world, while Bernie Marcus, born in Newark to Russian Jewish immigrants, co-founded Home Depot. Herman Hollerith, son of German immigrants, invented the punch card tabulator that became the technological foundation for IBM. At Ace Hardware, two of the five Chicago founders who built the world’s largest hardware cooperative were the sons of German and Swiss immigrants respectively.
Perhaps the most famous example of all is Henry Ford, the Michigan-born son and Ford Motor founder who was the son of an Irish immigrant father, whose fingerprint on innovation included key steps forward in codifying the 40-hour workweek and establishing the middle class.
Economic development at a grand scale
A 2025 analysis by the American Immigration Council found that 122 of the Fortune 500 companies were founded by the U.S.-born children of immigrants, all birthright citizens whose parents arrived from Syria, Romania, Ireland, Germany, Austria, and beyond. In fiscal year 2024, the 231 Fortune 500 companies founded by immigrants or their children generated $8.6 trillion in combined revenue, an amount that would rank as the third largest economy on earth, behind only the United States and China.
The 122 companies founded specifically by American-born children of immigrants are a significant part of that total—and a reminder that the children of people who came here seeking something better built the iPhone, the plane you fly on, and the warehouse where you buy your rotisserie chicken.
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