Listen: Levin: Both Cruz and Obama are Natural Born Citizens, Here's Why (video at Link)

Conservative Review ^

[Cboldt]

-- Apparently only Cruz can release his records from Canada and INS ... --

Hopefully he has no records in the INS! I think he's released all the material already. We have his birth certificate.

[ripnbang]

Welcome to the United States. Long may she reign.

[C. Edmund Wright]

you are wrong on one point....you don’t have to apply to be a US Citizen is your mother is a US citizen at your birth. The fact that you are also a Canadian citizen is irrelevant. There is nothing nothing nothing that says being a citizen of another country precludes one being a US citizen.

[ripnbang]

Yep....

[RummyChick]

It would be interesting to see if Ginsburg changes her mind about requirements for the clause if it pertains to Cruz. He also has another issue of what if mother became Canadian citizen as is rumored. It adds another layer to dissect.

[nclaurel]

Speculation yesterday was that mother and father were Canadian citizens at his birth. I would think that would make his mother having dual citizenship which still means she still had American citizenship. I think Cruz will put an end to this soon so there will be nothing for WH or Dems or GOP to go on about.

[St_Thomas_Aquinas]

Let the Trump followers and Grayson have fun with this. As Mark says, it’s a non-issue going nowhere.

And in the end, it will only hurt Trump.

[Lakeshark]

What do you need to see?

I read the birther stuff, found it sort of interesting when it was brought up in 2008. After that election, I came to see it as nothing more than a distraction, an issue that would never win for conservatives.

I was glad to see JR take the issue off the table here, and knew that if he hadn't a lot of people here would go nutzo and use it against our best candidate.

Last night, after reading about how the Cruz eligibility is being challenged in more than three states I began to rethink this a bit. Looking at it, it's pretty clear that the rats genuinely intend to use it against him in courts all over the land if he wins the nomination.

Last night, on another thread, I asked the following:

Does anyone here think if he gets the nomination that the media and the dems will let this issue stand and just go away nicey nice?

Whether you like it or not, whether it's true or not that he is a natural born citizen, it's a problem that needs to be met head on. The dems intend to use it, and the media will put it in our faces, that's clear.

The question I've got today: What's the best way to fight this?

[lodi90]

I turned Levin off after the veiled hits on Trump on last night. Fine to do that but what’s good for the goose is good for the gander and he isn’t doing that to Cruz right now. Alleging Trump “supported Canadian health care” or whatever while failing to mention U. S. Senator Cruz enabled Obama’s TPA is just silly.

Levin should just go ahead and endorse Cruz because it’s obvious that is his candidate. He’s going to turn off a lot of people with those catty attacks on Trump.

[Cboldt]

-- you are wrong on one point....you don't have to apply to be a US Citizen is your mother is a US citizen at your birth. --

I don't see how that makes any of my statements wrong. I didn't say he had to apply for or even register the birth abroad in order for the conditions of the US statute to be met. What I said was that his US citizenship depends on US statutory law.

-- There is nothing nothing nothing that says being a citizen of another country precludes one being a US citizen. --

In order to be useful in this argument, the contention you assert is "There is nothing nothing nothing that says being a citizen of another country precludes one being a natural born US citizen."

That nature of the issue produces exactly that condition, there won't be anything stated, because the answer or conclusion being sought is the "natural" one.

[onona]

I'm up early.

Blind Faith. It's not just for Ginger Baker, Eric Clapton, and Steve Winwood anymore.

Hi, i'm American.

Well, if you say so, it must be true.

[lodi90]

Let the Trump followers and Grayson have fun with this. As Mark says, it’s a non-issue going nowhere.

And in the end, it will only hurt Trump.

---

If it’s such a non issue why did Levin spend so much time on it? Trump makes a couple comments and Levin goes on for hours about it. Ruh roh.

[C. Edmund Wright]

Whether you like it or not, whether it's true or not that he is a natural born citizen, it's a problem that needs to be met head on. The dems intend to use it, and the media will put it in our faces, that's clear. The question I've got today: What's the best way to fight this?

Your burden of proof analysis is bass ackwards. He has already met it head on. What do you want??? A voice from Mt.Sinai? The SCOTUS to come out and pre emptively make a statement? There are people who are NEVER EVER going to be satisfied, and there are those who will ALWAYS want it to be an issue. It's ridiculous to worry about what the Dems use. We can NEVER appease them. Screw 'em.

Best way to fight it? Just do what Cruz did yesterday and let Levin and Rush and others pick up the cause. But do not focus on it.

[Cboldt]

-- Speculation yesterday was that mother and father were Canadian citizens at his birth. I would think that would make his mother having dual citizenship which still means she still had American citizenship. --

I haven't studied the details, but there is a question of whether of not a person obtaining Canadian Citizenship would have to renounce US Citizenship. The argument (assuming hypothetically that Ted's mother applied for and obtained Canadian citizenship) goes on to say that such renunciation is not recognized in the US. IOW, once a US Citizen, always a US Citizen, unless the statutory expatriation conditions are met.

Cruz's birth certificate says his mother's place of birth was Delaware, so her citizenship at the time of her birth appears to be clear.

Anyway, just adding some meat to support your contention; and emphasizing that the contention that Cruz's mother applied for and/or obtained Candian citizenship is conjecture.

[freebird5850]

I have one BC. Barry has tried to fake 3 or 4 now?

[randita]

Until or unless Cruz is elected POTUS, there is no case. As I read it, the Constitution addresses the requirements of those who may “serve” as POTUS, not those who are merely candidates.

And if Cruz is elected president, I’d wager that SCOTUS would not wade into that minefield, not after the flack they took over Florida in 2000.

It’s possible Congress has the purview to do something, but since it’s GOP, that’s unlikely.

[randita]

Cruz was born in Calgary in 1970 and by 1974, the family had moved and was living in Texas. I don’t know how long his parents were in Canada prior to 1970.

Cruz is a Constitutional scholar and I believe him to be ethical. If he had knowledge and records existed which proved his mother was a citizen of Canada at the time of his birth, he would not now be a candidate.

Those records could easily be produced by Canada.

[KGeorge]

No. Some of us have been up for a little bit. already.

[iontheball]

I listened intently to Mark last evening while he discussed the Cruz eligibility issue. I must say he seemed defensive, and did not display depth in his arguments. He is an expert on the Constitution but when it comes to the eligibility issue, whether it is Obozo or Cruz, he always begins his discussion in a very dismissive manner. Clearly Mark knows how to read the Constitution, but when it comes to the eligibility provision I can not help but believe he deliberately read it incorrectly to give emphasis to the word ‘citizen” as that word is found in the provision. He read the provision thusly, “No Person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, . . .”, stopping abruptly after the comma, suggesting that the term citizen as a sufficient qualification to be president when we all know that natural born citizen is a much higher standard. Actually, the term citizen in the clause is the ‘grandfather clause.’ Obviously, his reading completely distorted the provision. Another example is his historically odd refusal to accept callers on the eligibility issue. He will demean them by calling them kooks, whether it be in reference to Obozo or now Cruz. To a degree, this attitude is partly responsible for why we have the mess with the usurper in the White House. It is the same attitude that Republican elitist used to demean us on the issue. We could expect no less from liberals. It disrespects his audience. In short, I find it odd that on other Constitutional provisions he patiently goes into great detail on the history of the provisions, but when it comes to Article II eligibility he is very dismissive of the topic. He did so by claiming it was more important to discuss any other topic of the day but eligibility. This approach has always seemed odd to me because the provision is one of the most important provisions in the Constitution since it safeguards the nations national security. The wisdom of the framers, time and time again, displays divine providence in creating the Constitution and the eligibility provision is no exception. In my view, the courts have let these great men and our country down by breezing over one of the most important provisions in the Constitution.

For what is worth, here is my best shot on this complex topic.
There are three basic types of U.S. citizenship. 1. Foremost, there is a natural born citizen, 2. then there is the much broader class of ordinary U.S. citizen, and 3. lastly there is a naturalized U.S. citizen. These three variations are separate and distinct. Most lump together the first two, claiming that those who are U.S. citizens are also natural born citizens. Nothing could be further from the truth. The framers had to have in mind a much more demanding standard for president by insisting the person be a special class of individual, a natural born citizen. Take for example a natural born U.S. citizen women who works in the State Department overseas as a foreign service officer. While overseas she marries a Muslim. They have a son overseas and the son is raised for 25 years overseas as a Muslim, quietly instructed by the Muslim father to wage Jihad against America and they later move to the U.S and the husband naturalizes. At age 35, the son, while practicing taqiyah, runs for president at age 35. I believe the framers chose the words natural born citizen to ward against such disaster by distinguishing natural born citizen from the ordinary garden variety citizen, which this Muslim would be. The obvious reason was to insure that presidents’ loyalty to country would be unquestioned and as inviolate as humanly possible. Therefore, the framers by the words natural born citizen required that the parents be naturally born citizens (have one full generation of U.S. citizenship behind them (naturalizing citizenship would not be acceptable) before they could have a natural born citizen child and the child would have to be born on U.S. soil, not in some foreign land. This is a fully naturally born citizen, anything less is something else, it is not naturally born. Understanding their grave concern about possible British subversion, it seems likely that they endeavored to define as pure a class of U.S. citizenship as possible insisting that when it came to the president the individual be someone born on U.S. soil to two naturally born U.S. citizen spouses. Anything else would raise risks of disloyalty to America to unacceptable levels. One more illustrative example: A young male Syrian Jihadist slips into the U.S. as a ‘refugee’ and is naturalized. He marries a natural born U.S. citizen woman. They have a child who the father quietly raises as a Jihadist Muslim, and the son, schooled in taqiyah, runs for president at age 35. Is this person qualified under Article II to be president? The way we are bastardizing Article II, this individual would be deemed a naturally born citizen. Worse yet, we have no national security background screening or clearance procedure applicable for president. If the candidate is a good huckster, like Obozo, he can talk his way into the White House.

[Cboldt]

-- The question I've got today: What's the best way to fight this? --

Avoid confronting the issue on the merits, point to the Kaytal/Clement law review article, assert that the answer is clear. No court will take the issue up on the merits. All the cases can be dismissed on grounds of standing and justicability (it's up to Congress, not the courts, to find ineligibility).

Court precedent is 100% "no standing," and there are many cases to rely on.

Get the Senate to issue a Resolution, as it did for McCain.