Posted on 02/19/2016 6:36:53 AM PST by Enlightened1
Here is what the Constitution says about who can be president:
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.
The problem is the Constitution doesn't define "natural born Citizen." Neither does any current law. And no one has ever brought a court case to decisively settle the question as a matter of US law.
There are three ways someone can be a US citizen. He can be born in the US (regardless of who his parents are). He can be born outside the US to at least one US citizen parent, as long as certain criteria are met (those criteria are set by federal law and have been changed over time). Or he can immigrate here and then successfully apply for citizenship, a process called naturalization.
Everyone agrees that the first category of people are natural-born citizens. Everyone agrees that the third category of people are not natural-born citizens (regardless of how unfair it might be that immigrants can't be president). But Ted Cruz is in the middle category, and this is where the meaning of "natural born" starts to get fuzzy.
(Excerpt) Read more at vox.com ...
As a Cruz supporter, I actually see this as good news.
Ben Carson just sent out this tweet:
“Cruz eligibility in question. Court ruling may remove from ballot. Illegal candidacy court filings say.”
I agree it’s good news. The sooner this gets resolved the better. The reason Trump never sued it that it makes a better political issue than lawsuit.
ditto
Me too. It may have other implications as well.
What would happen if this court sets the Founder’s intent, born on American soil of American parents, as the standard for NBC status?
The current occupier doesn’t meet those standards.
What court is it going to and who is doing it? All I saw was a bunch of opinions on a website article. I didn’t see anything in this article about this actually going to court.
Ben with some pay back.
“Ben Carson just sent out this tweet:”
Other than to sell books. Why is Ben Carson still in the race?
Although I expect he will be declared eligible, it's too bad he didn't get some kid who was good at Photoshop to make him a fake BC like Hussein's.
It is a Carson supporter who filed this action
Bad news for Cruz?
Well it certainly is good news for the rest of us. Nobody needs a GOP candidate who is later ruled ineligible thereby risking the election being handed to the Socialist Democratic Party.
Cruz looks like he’s put his own political prospects ahead of America’s future by not putting this issue to bed along time ago. Why didn’t he?
There certainly is a genuine dispute over his NBC status. My opinion of him politically has gone down because of his failure to have had this issue decided.
Ultra-left blog. Anything that might hurt a conservative gets trumpeted.
And 0 got a free pass on his statement that he was born in Kenya.
You are absolutely correct. Trump is anything but dumb and as long as this is not put to bed there are a number of "potential" voters who will hesitate to support Cruz.
Ben’s revenge.
As i understand it Cruz was born of a American parent, so done deal for me. Even though he is the smartest person of the bunch, hes never governed, or produced anything in the private sector. I imagine him as an attorney general. Im leaning toward Kasich or Trump. If its Cruz, so be it and we all need to get on board in the fall and lock down that SCOTUS for a couple of decades.
Any question regarding “natural born citizen” isn’t even reached. Cruz is a naturalized citizen. Claiming that a “proceeding” is what makes one naturalized is mistaken, Congressional grants are naturalization. Naturalization statutes can require any proceeding or none, any retention requirements or none, include certain classes of persons or exclude them, require an oath or not. Congressional grants of citizenship, in all their varieties, are naturalization.
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