Posted on 08/21/2008 5:00:24 PM PDT by LdSentinal
A prominent Philadelphia attorney and Hillary Clinton supporter filed suit this afternoon in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania against Illinois Sen. Barack Obama and the Democratic National Committee. The action seeks an injunction preventing the senator from continuing his candidacy and a court order enjoining the DNC from nominating him next week, all on grounds that Sen. Obama is constitutionally ineligible to run for and hold the office of President of the United States.
Phillip Berg, the filing attorney, is a former gubernatorial and senatorial candidate, former chair of the Democratic Party in Montgomery (PA) County, former member of the Democratic State Committee, and former Deputy Attorney General of Pennsylvania. According to Berg, he filed the suit--just days before the DNC is to hold its nominating convention in Denver--for the health of the Democratic Party.
"I filed this action at this time," Berg stated, "to avoid the obvious problems that will occur when the Republican Party raises these issues after Obama is nominated.".
Berg cited a number of unanswered questions regarding the Illinois senator's background, and in today's lawsuit maintained that Sen. Obama is not a naturalized U.S. citizen or that, if he ever was, he lost his citizenship when he was adopted in Indonesia. Berg also cites what he calls "dual loyalties" due to his citizenship and ties with Kenya and Indonesia.
Even if Sen. Obama can prove his U.S. citizenship, Berg stated, citing the senator's use of a birth certificate from the state of Hawaii verified as a forgery by three independent document forensic experts, the issue of "multi-citizenship with responsibilities owed to and allegiance to other countries" remains on the table.
In the lawsuit, Berg states that Sen. Obama was born in Kenya, and not in Hawaii as the senator maintains. Before giving birth, according to the lawsuit, Obama's mother traveled to Kenya with his father but was prevented from flying back to Hawaii because of the late stage of her pregnancy, "apparently a normal restriction to avoid births during a flight." As Sen. Obama's own paternal grandmother, half-brother and half-sister have also claimed, Berg maintains that Stanley Ann Dunham--Obama's mother--gave birth to little Barack in Kenya and subsequently flew to Hawaii to register the birth.
Berg cites inconsistent accounts of Sen. Obama's birth, including reports that he was born at two separate hospitals--Kapiolani Hospital and Queens Hospital--in Honolulu, as well a profound lack of birthing records for Stanley Ann Dunham, though simple "registry of birth" records for Barack Obama are available in a Hawaiian public records office.
Should Sen. Obama truly have been born in Kenya, Berg writes, the laws on the books at the time of his birth hold that U.S. citizenship may only pass to a child born overseas to a U.S. citizen parent and non-citizen parent if the former was at least 19 years of age. Sen. Obama's mother was only 18 at the time. Therefore, because U.S. citizenship could not legally be passed on to him, Obama could not be registered as a "natural born" citizen and would therefore be ineligible to seek the presidency pursuant to Article II, Section 1 of the United States Constitution.
Moreover, even if Sen. Obama could have somehow been deemed "natural born," that citizenship was lost in or around 1967 when he and his mother took up residency in Indonesia, where Stanley Ann Dunham married Lolo Soetoro, an Indonesian citizen. Berg also states that he possesses copies of Sen. Obama's registration to Fransiskus Assisi School In Jakarta, Indonesia which clearly show that he was registered under the name "Barry Soetoro" and his citizenship listed as Indonesian.
The Hawaiian birth certificate, Berg says, is a forgery. In the suit, the attorney states that the birth certificate on record is a forgery, has been identified as such by three independent document forensic experts, and actually belonged to Maya Kasandra Soetoro, Sen. Obama's half-sister.
"Voters donated money, goods and services to elect a nominee and were defrauded by Sen. Obama's lies and obfuscations," Berg stated. "If the DNC officers ... had performed one ounce of due diligence we would not find ourselves in this emergency predicament, one week away from making a person the nominee who has lost their citizenship as a child and failed to even perform the basic steps of regaining citizenship as prescribed by constitutional laws."
"It is unfair to the country," he continued, "for candidates of either party to become the nominee when there is any question of the ability to serve if elected."
Yeah...but she has to be 19, eh?
Thank the Maker!
Maybe not.Bergs a “Truther” and McCain can beat Obama. What about Hillary?
The court has no jurisdiction over the DNC's choice for a candidate. The DNC can pick anyone they want to run. Also the person suing hasn't been directly harmed in any way by Obama's candidacy, so he has no grounds to sue in federal court.
IMHO, this case will get thrown out.
Right. Very lawyerly statement out of King Billy Jeff, huh?!
Pretty cool, good timing. With the poll numbers going down for Obama, the hard core ads about his “friends” coming out, Clinton getting a roll call vote at the convention and now a legitimate case being put forward in court as to his constitutional ineligibility to run for office. Id say the SD must be crapping their pants right about now.
I sure thought so!!!
The “test” for the bona fides comes at the Electoral College stage.
Thanks for the reminder. At the time I thought it was a strange statement from an oily politician known to be very careful with his words.
But doesn’t the DNC have to make sure that the candidate they pick is legally qualified to hold that office?
Even so, it will serve to draw the public’s attention to the birth certificate fraud..to his ‘foreigness’.
I have to believe that this is what the McCain people were meeting with Hillary’s brother about.
Your probably right.
Ping
And so it begins.
Why isn’t this a Federal issue? The office he’s running for isn’t a state office, it’s a Federal office, therefore under Federal jurisdiction.
Not if you weren’t a natural born citizen who is using a different name than that which is your legal name.
One question: does he have to give all the money back if he’s found guilty.
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