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And guess who its gonna work on? Red necks in red states. Let's see if north Carolina likes it that Cruz was born in socialist Canada to a communist father and a commy Cuban loving mom.Don't feel badly....
All you Democrat Party faithful are now under orders to go birfer.....
Can't you write his name in? I'll do it too. So Putin will get two votes.If we have to have another foreigner as president... I'm voting for Putin.
When Trump started to attack Cruz for not being a natural born citizen and therefor ineligible to be president, my first reaction was -despite my loathing for the man and fear of a Cruz presidency- that it is a cheap shot. Of course he is a citizen, I said. His mother was an American Citizen and even though he was undisputedly born in Canada, it is understood that she conveyed her American citizenship to him. As far as I was concerned, “natural born” was ever specifically defined by the founders and therefore there are only two kinds of citizenship…..those who are citizens at birth and those who are naturalized with the former being eligible for the presidency and the latter group not being eligible.
So, while I chose not to pursue it, I did have to muse about the thought of President Obama quietly enjoying the irony. My first inclination that maybe there was some substance to the claim by Trump was when a report surfaced that raised the question of whether or not his mother was in fact an American citizen at the time of his birth in 1970. (We know, and it is undisputed, that his father was not) It seems that both of his parents appeared on the Canadian voter registration rolls around that time, and that you must be a Canadian citizen to vote. So it is possible that his mother relinquished her American Citizenship at some point, and possible before his birth, which of course would be a game changer.
But regardless of his mother’s citizenship at the time of his birth, it is in fact a good deal more complicated than that, as is brought out in the articles below. Keep in mind that this is strictly a legal question and should not be about politics. The fact is that he is an American and there is no reason to believe that he has any foreign loyalties which was the fear of the founders of our country. He came to the United States at the age of four and his situation does not affect his eligibility in any substantive way. It is wholly a technical matter. However, imagine the turmoil that we would experience if he were elected president and subsequently, a viable challenge to his eligibility was mounted. Hell, it is already causing some degree of turmoil, as though there was not enough already.
Finally, I will say that I would still rather not go down this road and indeed it is not necessary to defeat Cruz. There already is more than enough to disqualify him as “the leader of the free world” and even as a human being….but the issue of eligibility is before us, so let’s have at it.
Here are a few interesting articles to kick it off. Please read them in their entirety before commenting in the hope that this can be an informed and intelligent exchange on the subject. Again, to be clear, I am not personally taking a position on his eligibility. It is an open discussion that should be about that and that only, as opposed to his politics.
Ted Cruz has a very real birther problem: The law is not settled — but the history is
The founders did restrict the presidency to natural-born citizens. Ted Cruz's status is deeply complicated
http://www.salon.com/2016/01/22/ted_cruz_has_a_very_real_birther_problem_the_law_is_not_settled_but_the_history_is/
Most who have studied the question at hand focus on the “original intent” of the founding generation. The most obvious problem concerns the meaning of “natural born” as written into the Constitution, and whether Cruz’s birth in Calgary disqualifies him. But two equally salient issues have been ignored. The first is that Cruz’s claim to natural-born status is based on his mother, because his Cuban-born father did become a Canadian citizen, and was only naturalized as an American citizen in 2005. Rafael Cruz came to the United States on a student visa, and kept his Cuban citizenship until he became a Canadian citizen. It is a historical fact (and a fact of law) that mothers did not possess the same right fathers did to grant their children American citizenship when the child was born outside of the United States. This is important.
To say that “natural born citizen” is settled law is nothing more than a rhetorical ploy. It is not surprising that legal experts Neal Katyal and Paul Clement of Georgetown took to the Harvard Law Review to argue the opposite side from Harvard’s Lawrence Tribe on Cruz’s eligibility, because the same argument has haunted past scholars. In 1988, long before the Cruz question arose, Jill Pryor wrote in the Yale Law Journal (scrupulously documented) that the question of whether a person born abroad of one American and one alien parent “qualifies as natural born” remains unresolved. The meaning of citizenship has changed over the course of American history, and yet the Supreme Court has never made a specific ruling on this part of Article II of the Constitution. Most recently, in Salon, Harvard legal scholar Einer Elhauge makes a strong case against Cruz’s eligibility; but even he does not go far enough to clarify the questionable status of a mother’s right to pass on her citizenship to her children
And then there is this
Ted Cruz is not eligible to run for president: A Harvard Law professor close-reads the Constitution Ted Cruz is not eligible to run for president: A Harvard Law professor close-reads the Constitution
,At common law “natural born” meant someone born within the sovereign territory with one narrow exception. The exception was for children of public officials serving abroad, which does not help Cruz because his parents were not serving the United States when he was born in Canada. The case of John McCain was entirely different because he was born in a U.S. territory (the Panama Canal Zone) and to U.S. parents who were serving the U.S. military.
, “natural born” meant someone born within the sovereign territory with one narrow exception. The exception was for children of public officials serving abroad, which does not help Cruz because his parents were not serving the United States when he was born in Canada. The case of John McCain was entirely different because he was born in a U.S. territory (the Panama Canal Zone) and to U.S. parents who were serving the U.S. military.
And there is more. His situation is very different from that of others who the birthers have targeted, namely Obama and Rubio…….
This is the Ted Cruz “birther” dilemma: He’s certainly an American. But “natural born” is a real question
http://www.salon.com/2016/01/22/this_is_the_ted_cruz_birther_dilemma_hes_certainly_an_american_but_natural_born_is_a_real_question/
A skill all lawyers need to develop is the ability to distinguish between a real legal argument and a fake one. A real legal argument isn’t necessarily a winning argument: rather, it’s an argument that could be expected to have some actual chance of winning the day, given various (realistic) assumptions regarding whatever authority figures will end up deciding whether the argument is right or wrong.
Arguments that Barack Obama wasn’t constitutionally eligible to be president were always fake legal arguments through and through, because there was never the slightest possibility that any federal court was going to accept such an argument. The reason no court would even consider those arguments is that they were all based on an obviously false, and indeed classically paranoid, claim: that Obama wasn’t born in Hawaii.
The argument that Marco Rubio isn’t eligible to be president because his parents weren’t U.S. citizens at the time of his birth– a lawsuit making this argument has just been filed in Florida – is also a fake legal argument. There is essentially no support for this position in American law. It’s the kind of claim, in other words, that can subject a lawyer to sanctions for bringing it. (Orly Taitz, the most indefatigable of the Obama “birthers,” was fined $20,000 by a federal court for bringing a similarly ridiculous claim).
The situation regarding Ted Cruz is completely different. The argument that Cruz isn’t a natural born citizen within the meaning of Article II of the Constitution, and is therefore ineligible to be president, is absolutely a real legal argument. Indeed, the argument that he is eligible, despite being born in Canada, is quite technical, convoluted, and far from compelling.
The situation is different- but Cruz is still eligible.
It is fun watching the GOP attack each other on the issue= Trump is playing this like a fisherman playing a fish.
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Or terrorist Muslim Isis sympathizers born in America can go to Iraq and father hundreds of Americans with hundreds of women. Would they all be Americans?
And guess who its gonna work on? Red necks in red states. Let's see if north Carolina likes it that Cruz was born in socialist Canada to a communist father and a commy Cuban loving mom.Don't feel badly....
All you Democrat Party faithful are now under orders to go birfer.....
Just because that woman was an American doesn't make Ted eligible to run.
Let's say a commy loving subversive anti American woman born here went to Russia and had a baby with Putin? Can that kid run for president?
How about if an American Muslim had a baby in the middle East with bin laden?
I disagree. We all learned differently now you say they changed the law? I say bs. It's even a question on the citizen test. Even foreign Americans know. Now you do too.Let's say a commy loving subversive anti American woman born here went to Russia and had a baby with Putin? Can that kid run for president?
How about if an American Muslim had a baby in the middle East with bin laden?
What part about the Constitution and the law don't you understand?
A child born to an American citizen outside the United States is born an American citizen- hence natural born.
Doesn't mean that American voters will vote for the person- but eligible yes.
I disagree. We all learned differently now you say they changed the law? I say bs. It's even a question on the citizen test. Even foreign Americans know. Now you do too.Let's say a commy loving subversive anti American woman born here went to Russia and had a baby with Putin? Can that kid run for president?
How about if an American Muslim had a baby in the middle East with bin laden?
What part about the Constitution and the law don't you understand?
A child born to an American citizen outside the United States is born an American citizen- hence natural born.
Doesn't mean that American voters will vote for the person- but eligible yes.
I'm not comfortable with thatI disagree. We all learned differently now you say they changed the law? I say bs. It's even a question on the citizen test. Even foreign Americans know. Now you do too.Let's say a commy loving subversive anti American woman born here went to Russia and had a baby with Putin? Can that kid run for president?
How about if an American Muslim had a baby in the middle East with bin laden?
What part about the Constitution and the law don't you understand?
A child born to an American citizen outside the United States is born an American citizen- hence natural born.
Doesn't mean that American voters will vote for the person- but eligible yes.
The law hasn't changed.
A child born to an American citizen outside the United States is an American citizen.
There are no 'foreign Americans'- there are only Americans.
There are two type of American citizenship- natural born and naturalized- Cruz was never naturalized- so he is a natural born citizen.
