Posted on 08/25/2008 7:42:37 PM PDT by neverdem
PHILADELPHIA - A Lafayette Hill attorney filed a lawsuit in federal court Thursday challenging Sen. Barack Obama's claim to United States citizenship. The action seeks to remove the Democratic candidate from the November ballot.
To be eligible to serve as U.S. president, a person must be born in this country. According to Obama's birth certificate, which his campaign posted on its Internet site in June to quell rumors that he is foreign born, the Illinois senator was born in Hawaii on Aug. 6, 1961. On Thursday, Philip Berg filed a temporary restraining order in federal court to bar Obama from running for president, claiming the Democratic candidate was actually born in Africa.
"We really don't believe he was born in Hawaii," Berg said. "We think he was born in Kenya."
The presidential candidate's father, Barack Obama Sr., was born and raised in a small village in Kenya, according to Obama's campaign Web site.
Berg's suit claims the senator's grandmother, brother and sister, who live in Kenya, believe they were present during Obama's birth in the African country.
Obama's mother, Ann Dunham, grew up in Kansas, and his parents met at the University of Hawaii when Dunham was a student there, according to the Obama campaign. Eventually, Obama's father returned to Kenya, and his son grew up in Hawaii with his mother and for a few years in Indonesia after Dunham married an Indonesian man, Lolo Soetoro. Also, Obama lived with his maternal grandparents in Hawaii.
"If he was born in Hawaii, and he was adopted in Indonesia by Lolo Soetoro, (Obama) would lose his citizenship," Berg said.
The Obama campaign has a special section on its Web site, "Fight the Smears," that debunks the birth certificate story and other reports that have circulated about him during the campaign.
"It's part of a smear campaign," said an Obama campaign volunteer who identified herself as Rachel. "There are just so many lies out there."
The lawsuit claims three "independent" document forensic experts performed extensive tests on the digitally-scanned image of Obama's "Certificate of Live Birth" posted on the campaign's site and found the document to be "a forgery."
Jerome Corsi, author of the book, "The Obama Nation: Leftist Politics and the Cult of Personality," has also deemed the birth certificate phony, according to The Annenberg Political Fact Check, www.FactCheck.org.
The Annenberg Political Fact Check, a project of the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania, aims to expose deception and confusion in U.S. politics.
Recently, FactCheck.org staffers "touched, examined and photographed" the original birth certificate kept at the Obama campaign headquarters in Chicago and concluded the document is genuine.
"The evidence is clear: Barack Obama was born in the U.S.A.," FactCheck.org staffers concluded.
Sean Smith, Obama's Pennsylvania communications director, was contacted Friday about the suit but declined comment.
The civil suit filed by Berg will be reviewed by the U.S. Federal Election Commission, according to Patty Hartman, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.
Keith Phucas can be reached at kphucas@timesherald.com or 610-272-2500, ext. 211.
Thanks for the ping!
except the photos have a date of MARCH 2008 and the Certificate has a the serial number mis-aligned (the rest of the variable data is not)
This ain't over.
Factcheck is an Annenberg organisation, the same Annenberg of the "Chicago Anneberg Challenge" that Obama chaired, Ayers received money from, and is hiding it's records from public scrutiny.
Define ‘real FReeper’.. does that mean prostituting your values to vote for a pseudo-conservative? or maybe does that mean fear-mongering and ‘peer pressure’ to maintain the status quo?
Cause he's a democrat.
Heck, IIRC several dems have even run for office not under their real names. I believe Clinton and Kerry are among two of them.
OUCH!
Ummmm, I’m still here. Since 1997.
I don’t know quite what to think about this story, but I know that FactCheck.org sometimes needs fact checking. They made many errors in evaluating HILLARY! UNCENSORED.
I’d like to know why Obama apparently had posted a birth certificate that may well have been a phony. Perhaps the lawsuit will bring out all the facts and we can get on with the campaign.
Me want Viking Kitty
Viking Kitty Now
One would hope that the plaintiff knew something about the Judge that was likely to be scheduled.
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Please define “natural born” as opposed to a “citizen of the United States”.
“Please define natural born as opposed to a citizen of the United States.”
The entire paragraph says:
“No person except a natural born citizen, or a citizen of the United States, at the time of the adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the office of President; neither shall any person be eligible to that office who shall not have attained to the age of thirty five years, and been fourteen Years a resident within the United States. “
Natural born citizen, or a citizen of the United States at, the time of the adoption of this Constitution...
The second part of that (or a citizen..at the time...) allowed for a President to be elected from the body of people that were alive before the United States became the United States.
Hope that clears it up for you.
"If they lose and Obama is not eligible, they are absolutely finished as a political organization."
If Obama leaves Denver as the nominee, and it is proven later that Obama is ineligible, they are done as a legitimate political organization. They will have willfully lied to the public about the legal status of their candidate and directly tried to violate the constitution. I don't see how they could benefit from such action. The only benefit to such an action would be an after the fact. After four years of Obama, they would then trot out his real birth certificate, and say see, he's not really a "Natural Born' and he's been just fine, and we should repeal that requirement from the constitution. That's the set up and the end game, as I see it. Violate and subvert the constitution to force a constitutional crisis/convention. A convention that would enshrine socialism into the Constitution, repeal the the 2nd amendment and severely modify the 1st to limit "hate" speech.
There is no requirement that the candidate be born in the USA.
There may be questions about how old Stanley was when she gave birth, but that gets into an area where the statute has been tweaked a bit over the years.
I'd be very surprised if anything serious came of all this- you never know, but if it depends on court interpretations of something the public can be confused by the press on, I think things will go in favor of Obama.
Pass the popcorn, with butter and Frank's Hot Sauce, please!
“Yes it did, thanks. I’m not awake yet. The Constitution does not define natural born clearly.”
Which has long been a subject of debate. There are lots of different agencies that define it. I wonder if a Ceasarian (sp?) born person is diallowed.
“I fear The Supremes will need to rule on this if push comes to shove.”
There’s ANOTHER disater waiting to happen.
“There is no requirement that the candidate be born in the USA.”
Right, but PRESUMABLY they must be born of US parents.
“There may be questions about how old Stanley was when she gave birth, but that gets into an area where the statute has been tweaked a bit over the years.”
Which statute though? I mean, if immigration law says “blah blah makes you a citizen and blah blah makes you NOT a citizen”, then for now, that’s what counts.
“I’d be very surprised if anything serious came of all this- you never know, but if it depends on court interpretations of something the public can be confused by the press on, I think things will go in favor of Obama.”
Things don’t need to go bad for him to not be elected. Whether he wins his court case will be irrelevent.
Look at 2000. Supreme Court didn’t “decide the election”, but the talking heads in charge of the hive SAID SO, and for eight years, we’ve continued to hear this lie.
“Pass the popcorn, with butter and Frank’s Hot Sauce, please!”
I just like the thought that the arrogant punk will be shown some humility. (”I’m the one we’ve been waiting for”, indeed)
“According to Obama’s birth certificate, which his campaign posted on its Internet site in June “
It did no such thing. Why are “reporters” always liars and propagandists with a political agenda of supporting the Democrap Party?
Bump. Too bad the haters are blind to this little fact.
Thanks for the favor.
Not according to the State Department (and McCain wasn't born on the base- he was born in a Panamanian hospital a few miles away):
Despite widespread popular belief, U.S. military installations abroad and U.S. diplomatic or consular facilities are not part of the United States within the meaning of the 14th Amendment. A child born on the premises of such a facility is not subject to the jurisdiction of the United States and does not acquire U.S. citizenship by reason of birth.
http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/86755.pdf
Obama was born to muslims in Kenya, neither of which was over 18 and a citizen.
There's no evidence that Obama was born in Kenya, at least nothing more than second-hand reports.
Look, extraordinary claimes require extraordinary proof. Until someone can provide some actual documentary evidence that Obama was not born in the US, this is just kookery.
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