FLORHAM PARK, N.J. (AP) — Connor McGovern was sitting on his couch at home watching the New York Jets in their season opener on Monday night and couldn't help but yell at the TV and cheer on his buddies.
“My wife was like, ‘You’re not even on the team yet!'” McGovern said Thursday with a smile. “I was like, ‘Yeah, but those are my boys out there.’”
The veteran center had been contemplating retirement before coming in for a workout Wednesday with the Jets, the team with which he played the past four years. He was signed to their practice squad a few hours later.
“If or when this team goes to the playoffs and if I wasn’t helping in some capacity,” the 31-year-old McGovern said, “I’d be pretty disappointed that I didn’t seize any opportunity I had to come have another ride with this group and be a part of something special.”
McGovern was the team’s starting center until a dislocated left kneecap ended his year halfway through last season. He also had damage to his MCL in the knee from an injury in 2022. McGovern wore a full sleeve on his left leg as he practiced for the first time Thursday.
Joe Tippmann took over as the Jets’ center after McGovern's injury and did a solid job as a rookie and remains the starter. Meanwhile, McGovern became a free agent in the offseason and was coming off a serious knee injury.
“After I got hurt, I called my wife and was like, ‘Well, that’s it. We’re hanging 'em up,’” McGovern recalled. “And my agent was like, ‘No, no, there will be a spot for you somewhere. Just get healthy, come back and just be ready for an opportunity.’”
And it came at a familiar place.
“I really miss the guys,” he said. “I miss being around this building and being around this organization. And as soon as they gave me an opportunity to come back, I said, ‘Yeah, I need to be back.’”
McGovern spent his first four NFL seasons with Denver after being drafted in the fifth round out of Missouri in 2016. He signed as a free agent with the Jets in 2020 and was the anchor of New York’s offensive line until injuring his knee in Week 7 last year.
“There are some plateaus in there that I wasn’t expecting and a little bit of a longer journey than I really originally had anticipated,” he said of the rehabilitation period. “I normally take pride on being a quick healer and as I hit 30, I think I’m pretty average now.”
McGovern stayed in touch with many of his Jets teammates throughout the offseason, including quarterback Aaron Rodgers. He was part of a group outing with Rodgers in January when the QB made a hole-in-one — "best golf shot I've ever been around — in Las Vegas.
“I feel so much a part of this team and this organization,” McGovern said. “I’ve always been a Jet with a lot of pride and really enjoyed my time here. And yeah, the only team I’d be willing to come back to be on the P-squad on would be this one, for sure, with this group of guys.”
NOTES: LT Tyron Smith got a veteran rest day from practice after the Jets had a walkthrough session Wednesday. ... DL Javon Kinlaw had an excused second day away from the team for the birth of his son. ... DL Micheal Clemons (triceps), CB Michael Carter II (ankle) and CB D.J. Reed (knee) were limited.
AP NFL: https://apnews.com/hub/NFL
FILE - New York Jets center Connor McGovern (60) blocks at the line of scrimmage during the second half an NFL football game against the New England Patriots, Sept. 24, 2023, in New York. (AP Photo/Bryan Woolston, File)
President Donald Trump moved to end a decades-old immigration policy known as birthright citizenship when he ordered the cancellation of the constitutional guarantee that U.S.-born children are citizens regardless of their parents’ status.
Trump's roughly 700-word executive order, issued late Monday, amounts to a fulfillment of something he's talked about during the presidential campaign. But whether it succeeds is far from certain as attorneys general in 18 states and two cities challenged the order in court on Tuesday, seeking to block the president.
Here's a closer look at birthright citizenship, Trump's executive order and reaction to it:
Birthright citizenship means anyone born in the U.S. is a citizen, regardless of their parents' immigration status. People, for instance, in the United States on a tourist or other visa or in the country illegally can become the parents of a citizen if their child is born here.
It's been in place for decades and enshrined in the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, supporters say. But Trump and allies dispute the reading of the amendment and say there need to be tougher standards on becoming a citizen.
The order questions that the 14th Amendment extends citizenship automatically to anyone born in the United States.
The 14th Amendment was born in the aftermath of the Civil War and ratified in 1868. It says: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”
Trump's order excludes the following people from automatic citizenship: those whose mothers were not legally in the United States and whose fathers were not U.S. citizens or lawful permanent residents; people whose mothers were in the country legally but on a temporary basis and whose fathers were not citizens or legal permanent residents.
It goes on to bar federal agencies from recognizing the citizenship of people in those categories. It takes effect 30 days from Tuesday, on Feb. 19.
The 14th Amendment did not always guarantee birthright citizenship to all U.S.-born people. Congress did not authorize citizenship for all Native Americans born in the United States, for instance, until 1924.
In 1898 an important birthright citizenship case unfolded in the U.S. Supreme Court. The court held that Wong Kim Ark, who was born in San Francisco to Chinese immigrants, was a U.S. citizen because he was born in the country. After a trip abroad, he had faced denied reentry by the federal government on the grounds that he wasn't a citizen under the Chinese Exclusion Act.
But some advocates of immigration restrictions have argued that while the case clearly applied to children born to parents who are both legal immigrants, it’s less clear whether it applies to children born to parents without legal status.
Eighteen states, plus the District of Columbia and San Francisco sued in federal court to block Trump's order.
New Jersey Democratic Attorney General Matt Platkin said Tuesday the president cannot undo a right written into the Constitution with a stroke of his pen.
“Presidents have broad power but they are not kings,” Platkin said.
Not long after Trump signed the order, immigrant rights groups filed suit to stop it.
Chapters of the American Civil Liberties Union in New Hampshire, Maine and Massachusetts along with other immigrant rights advocates filed a suit in New Hampshire federal court.
The suit asks the court to find the order to be unconstitutional. It highlights the case of a woman identified as “Carmen," who is pregnant but is not a citizen. The lawsuit says she has lived in the United States for more than 15 years and has a pending visa application that could lead to permanent status. She has no other immigration status, and the father of her expected child has no immigration status either, the suit says.
“Stripping children of the ‘priceless treasure’ of citizenship is a grave injury,” the suit said. "It denies them the full membership in U.S. society to which they are entitled."
In addition to New Jersey and the two cities, California, Massachusetts, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Wisconsin joined the lawsuit to stop the order.
President-elect Donald Trump, from left, takes the oath of office as Barron Trump and Melania Trump watch at the 60th Presidential Inauguration in the Rotunda of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025. (Kevin Lamarque/Pool Photo via AP)
President Donald Trump signs executive orders in the Oval Office of the White House, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
U.S. flags around the Washington Monument are at full staff during the 60th Presidential Inauguration, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025, in Washington. Flags are supposed to fly at half-staff through the end of January out of respect for former President Jimmy Carter, who died Dec. 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Julio Cortez)
A young man reacts to information on how to prepare for the upcoming changes to undocumented families living in the U.S., Sunday, Jan. 19, 2025, in Miami. (AP Photo/Marta Lavandier)
Sonia Rosa Sifore and other anti-Trump protesters gather in Federal Plaza to rally for a number of issues, including immigrant rights, the Israel-Hamas war, women's reproductive rights, racial equality and others, on the day of President Trump's Inauguration, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025, in Chicago. (AP Photo/Erin Hooley)
President Donald Trump signs an executive order on birthright citizenship in the Oval Office of the White House, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)