Hon. Brian P. Kemp
Georgia Secretary of State
214 State Capitol Atlanta, Georgia 30334
via email to Vincent R. Russo Jr., Esq.
(vrusso@sos.ga.gov)
Re: Georgia Presidential Preference Primary Hearings
Dear Secretary Kemp:
This is to advise you of serious problems that have developed in the conduct of the hearings pending before the Office of State Administrative Hearings. At issue in these hearings are challenges that allege that President Obama is not eligible to hold or run for re-election to his office, on the now wholly discredited theory that he does not meet the citizenship requirements. As you know, such allegations have been the subject of numerous judicial proceedings around the country, all of which have concluded that they were baseless and, in some instances – including in the State of Georgia - that those bringing the challenges have engaged in sanctionable abuse of our legal process.
Nonetheless, the Administrative Law Judge has exercised no control whatsoever over this proceeding, and it threatens to degenerate into a pure forum for political posturing to the detriment of the reputation of the State and your Office. Rather than bring this matter to a rapid conclusion, the ALJ has insisted on agreeing to a day of hearings, and on the full participation of the President in his capacity as a candidate. Only last week, he denied a Motion to Quash a subpoena he approved on the request of plaintiff’s counsel for the personal appearance of the President at the hearing, now scheduled for January 26.
For these reasons, and as discussed briefly below, you should bring an end to this baseless, costly and unproductive hearing by withdrawing the original hearing request as improvidently issued.
It is well established that there is no legitimate issue here—a conclusion validated time and again by courts around the country. The State of Hawaii produced official records documenting birth there; the President made documents available to the general public by placing them on his website. “Under the United States Constitution, a public record of a state is required to be given ‘full faith and credit’ by all other states in the country. Even if a state were to require its election officials for the first time ever to receive a ‘birth certificate’ as a requirement for a federal candidate’s ballot placement, a document certified by another state, such as a ‘short form’ birth certificate, or the certified long form, would be required to be accepted by all states under the ‘full faith and credit’ clause of the United States Constitution.” Maskell, “Qualifications for President and the “Natural Born” Citizenship Eligibility Requirement,” Congressional Research Service (November 14, 2011), p.41.
Nonetheless, the ALJ has decided, for whatever reason, to lend assistance through his office—and by extension, yours—to the political and legally groundless tactics of the plaintiffs. One of the attorneys for the plaintiffs has downloaded form subpoenas which she tried to serve around the country. Plaintiff’s attorney sent subpoenas seeking to force attendance by an office machine salesman in Seattle; seeking to force the United States Attorney to bring an unnamed “Custodian of Records Department of Homeland Security” to attend the hearing with immunization records; and asking the same U.S. Attorney to bring the same records allegedly possessed by “Custodian of Records of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.” She served subpoenas attempting to compel the production of documents and the attendance of Susan Daniels and John Daniels, both apparently out of state witnesses, regarding Social Security records. She is seeking to compel the Director of Health for the State of Hawaii to bring to Atlanta the “original typewritten 1961 birth certificate #10641 for Barack Obama, II, issued 08.08.1961 by Dr. David Sinclair…,” even though Hawaii courts had dismissed with prejudice the last attempt to force release of confidential records on November 9, 2011. Taitz v. Fuddy, CA No. 11-1-1731-08 RAN.
In Rhodes v. McDonald, 670 F. Supp. 2d 1363, 1365 (USDC MD GA, 2009), Judge Clay Land wrote this of plaintiff’s attorney:
When a lawyer files complaints and motions without a reasonable basis for believing that they are supported by existing law or a modification or extension of existing law, that lawyer abuses her privilege to practice law. When a lawyer uses the courts as a platform for political agenda disconnected from any legitimate legal cause of action, that lawyer abuses her privilege to practice law….
As a national leader in the so-called ‘birther movement,’ Plaintiff’s counsel has attempted to use litigation to provide the ‘legal foundation’ for her political agenda. She seeks to use the Court’s power to compel discovery in her efforts force the President to produce a ‘birth certificate’ that is satisfactory to herself and her followers.” 670 F. Supp. 2d at 1366.
All issues were presented to your hearing officer—the clear-cut decision to be on the merits, and the flagrantly unethical and unprofessional conduct of counsel—and he has allowed the plaintiffs’ counsel to run amok. He has not even addressed these issues—choosing to ignore them. Perhaps he is aware that there is no credible response; perhaps he appreciates that the very demand made of his office—that it address constitutional issues—is by law not within its authority. See, for example, Flint River Mills v. Henry, 234 Ga. 385, 216 S.E.2d 895 (1975); Ga. Comp. R. & Regs. r. 616-1-2-.22(3).
The Secretary of State should withdraw the hearing request as being improvidently issued. A referring agency may withdraw the request at any time. Ga. Comp. R. & Regs. r. 616-1-2-.17(1). Indeed, regardless of the collapse of proceedings before the ALJ, the original hearing request was defective as a matter of law. Terry v. Handel, 08cv158774S (Superior Court Fulton County, 2008), appeal dismissed, No. S09D0284 (Ga. Supreme Court), reconsideration denied, No. S09A1373. (“The Secretary of State of Georgia is not given any authority that is discretionary nor any that is mandatory to refuse to allow someone to be listed as a candidate for President by a political party because she believes that the candidate might not be qualified.”) Similarly, no law gives the Secretary of State authority to determine the qualifications of someone named by a political party to be on the Presidential Preference Primary ballot. Your duty is determined by the statutory requirement that the Executive Committee of a political party name presidential preference primary candidates. O.C.G.A. § 21-2-193. Consequently, the attempt to hold hearings on qualifications which you may not enforce is ultra vires.
We await your taking the requested action, and as we do so, we will, of course, suspend further participation in these proceedings, including the hearing scheduled for January 26.
Very truly yours,
MICHAEL JABLONSKI
Georgia State Bar Number 385850
Attorney for President Barack Obama
cc: Hon. Michael Malihi (c/o Kim Beal (kbeal@osah.ga.gov))
Van Irion, Esq. (van@libertylegalfoundation.org)
Orly Taitz, Esq. (orly.taitz@gmail.com)
Mark Hatfield, Esq. (mhatfield@wayxcable.com)
Vincent R. Russo Jr., Esq. (vrusso@sos.ga.gov)
Stefan Ritter, Esq. (sritter@law.ga.gov)
Ann Brumbaugh, Esq. (abrumbaugh@law.ga.gov)
Darcy Coty, Esq. (darcy.coty@usdoj.gov)
Andrew B. Flake, Esq. (andrew.flake@agg.com)
Just thought you guys would be interested in this new twist to the Georgia Ballot Challenge. Doesn’t look like the attorney will be participating! hmmm....
The judge read the Statutes as pretty straightforward. Why Obama refuses to comply may soon be brought to light.
The judge should deny Obama’s entry on the ballot.
The only reason the hearing is going forward is because Bammy’s lawyer wrote an incompetent motion to quash. He didn’t give the judge any reason recognized by law to quash a subpoena. The judge isn’t insisting on anything. Bammy didn’t meet his burden of proof.
if the accusations are baseless then why has he refused to show them and why does he continue to spend money in order to not show them.?
Hell even the most radical left wing nut can see something is not right here.
If they cannot see it and not get past their letter D then they need to ask themselves if this was a republican would they still defend the actions what zero is doing.
This defense letter seems to be similar thereunto to the man who pleaded with the judge that he didn’t steal the cow, but merely found a rope and took it home with him totally unaware that there was a cow on the other end of the rope.
It Zero has a legitimate birth certificate in the vault at the Hawaii Dept. of Health, then all he has to do is produce it with the proper state seal embossed on it. Every citizen born in Hawaii can do this so why can’t he?
Now, isn’t this special. Finally, the case arrives in front of a judge that cannot be bullied and doesn’t seem to be amenable to bribery or threats and what happens? Obama’s stooges try to make an end-run about the entire court apparatus by appealing to the State AG to take the trial away from that judge.
Why am I not surprised?
Orly is right about one thing, if there is one thing that Obama has proven beyond any shadow of a doubt in the last three years is that he will do literally anything to avoid an open look at his records.
Hopefully the State AG will tell Obama to piss up a rope, but I won’t hold my breath. The criminal enterprise known as the Democrat Party (which includes 90% of the media) has far too much invested in that lying snake.
They’ll find a way to squash this court proceeding. They always do.
Jablonski and Obama are using the “Mayor Bosco” defense:
http://www.roadsideamerica.com/story/19948
Ie bar for nomination should be as low as it can be.
—IMHO, weak argument. And why wait until the last day? That looks really desperate. Either the fix is in (what is the chance that SoS Kemp wants to look like the spoiler by canceling the hearing at the last moment?), or they failed to get the fix in.
At the least, it seems evident that they were unable to reach Malihi. So here comes the Hail Mary pass.
I am not a lawyer but Terry v Handel seems as if it should only apply to cases filed well past the primary, since apparently it was filed only two weeks before the general
general election, sometime in October 2008...
Absolutely nothing is going to come from this. Just like all the other birther stuff that is breathlessly reported, in the end, amounts to nothing.
Orly found some administrative law judge to allow her to proceed for the moment, in the end some other court will probably just slap this judge down.
The only way to get rid of Hussein is to vote him out. Birther attempts to keep him off the ballot are not going to work.
Instead, I predict that either A) Obama tries to strong-arm the court with a fake birth certificate or out-of-court website evidence, B) Obama bails out and allows a default judgment, or C) His lawyers find a way to delay the case and/or get an injunction and convince a higher court to dismiss the case.link
I am not good at reading these things. Does it say that if the Georgia Secretary of State does not act to cancel the court hearing that Obama will not show for the Subpoena and that even his attorney is refusing to show?
What would happen to me if id did that, Not show and not even have an attorney present. Wouldn’t that mean I was in contempt and a warrant would be issued for me.
Wouldn’t that also mean that a trial judge copuld find tfor the Plaintive and stop Obamas name from going on the ballot?
This looks to me like pressure is being applied on the State to have the Secrtetary of State interfere with the legal p[roceeding of it’s court.
Unfortunately only we here in Free republic even know about this as the Media is totally silent on the whole thing. At least I havent seen this on the news.
So, where, did you, learn, to punctuate, sentences?
Or do you, get paid, by the, comma?
The fraud in the White House shows signs of complete delusion and, incidentally, a heavy addiction to something. If he has either or both of these problems, he may blunder into the November election thinking that most of us love him and he can hold the presidency for the next forty years. (Constitution, schmonstitution....)
If BHO is not completely deluded, he may know that he has little chance of winning a legitimate second election. If so, he will have to engineer something other than a legitimate election. This is why, hard as the fight might be and long as the odds against success look, getting him off the ballots in a few battleground states is a prize worth pursuing. Go Orly!