It’s official today. Ted Cruz is running for president. The Canadian-born Cruz, with only one U. S. Citizen parent, is blatantly ineligible to the office–if you buy into what the birthers have been saying since late 2008.
Cruz seems to be going for the politically far right by announcing his candidacy at Jerry Falwell’s Liberty University. How much of that far right crowd will write him off because they think him ineligible? YouGov conducted a poll in August of 2013 and found:
… more than half of Republicans (53%) would [theoretically] disqualify Texas Senator Ted Cruz from the Presidency on principle. Cruz was born in Canada to a mother who was an American citizen, while his father was not. But fewer than one in four Republicans think Cruz was born outside the country; only 10% know his mother was a citizen and his father was not.
Clearly the Cruz camp doesn’t think this issue is a show stopper. I personally think that those who make such a racket over their idiosyncratic definition of “natural born citizen” will readily cast principle aside, and vote based on other considerations, and justify it, if at all, by “if Obama can get away with it…”
In a sense the Cruz controversy takes us back to late 2008 when the first eligibility brief with the two-citizen parent theory appeared. The Supreme Court has refused to hear any of the appeals of these cases, even one this past week, I believe because the issue is settled. Eleven courts ruled the same way, and as federal district judge Gibney said, the question for those born in the country is “well settled.” The same cannot be said for the foreign-born Cruz. While a majority of contemporary authorities seem to conclude that foreign-born citizens at birth are natural born citizens, there is no legal precedent such as US v. Wong to settle the matter. I myself had a very difficult time deciding this question, eventually coming down on the side of “natural born citizen” = “citizen at birth.”
And so we come full circle back to Professor George Gordon’s 1968 scenario for adjudicating the definition of “natural born citizen.” To get this into court and on track for the Supreme Court will take a viable candidate suing Cruz to keep him from being nominated by the Republican Party.
Meanwhile, birthers pleading for legitimacy, take every joke from liberals about Cruz eligibility as justification for their joke of a movement, for example this comment from 1600_Penn:
How can these libtards be conveniently ignorant about Barry, yet appear to have some semblance of understanding about the birth certificate issue when it comes to Cruz?
MAYBE justice IS coming through the back door.
They are setting their own traps!! I do love me some Karma.
Boo yeah!
I just watched Whoopi Goldberg on the View.
Everybody’s going……..birther!
Finally, they get it.
Reagan In. Castro Up.
Teach your kids Spanish or else.
I wrote about this last year when WND washed its hands of Cruz birtherism, even though by its narrow definition of “natural born citizen” (born inside U.S. to two U.S. citizens), Cruz doesn’t qualify.
http://conwebwatch.tripod.com/stories/2014/wndcruz.html
That’s why birthers have been shifting to focusing on the supposed veracity of Obama’s birth certificate rather than overall “eligibility.”
Donald Trump has gone full birther on Cruz:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/donald-trump-birther-ted-cruz
I guess they’ll pull each other down…
Cruz should get what he deserves. He has pandered to the crazies. It is beautiful to watch them turn on him.
I love me some RWNJ on RWNJ backbiting! But I think its gonna Cruz’s ideals that will take him out of the running. He is vehemently opposed to marriage equality, and he insists on rubbing elbows with the looniest right wing personalities.
freeper gulch reacts:
Dedicated Obot here who has ben on birther blogs all day today defending the very right wing Senator Cruz!
I heard Cruz was born in Kenya!
Just sayin’
Maybe his mother was.
Will birthers be the albatross around the Cruz candidacy? Not if they don’t get a hell of a lot better at it.
This whole thing about Cruz is just……wait for it…….gut wrenching and universe shattering.
I’m seeing some interesting…things in the new articles about Cruz’s eligibility.
On NPR–
“The U.S. Constitution says presidential candidates have to be “natural-born citizens.””
http://www.npr.org/blogs/itsallpolitics/2015/03/23/394713013/is-ted-cruz-allowed-to-run-since-he-was-born-in-canada
At Time–
“In theory, that 1790 law (the Naturalization Act) could be unconstitutional too, were the natural-born citizen issue to make it to the Supreme Court…”
http://time.com/3754408/ted-cruz-history-natural-born/
From the Washington Post–
“Cruz’s mother was a U.S. citizen when he was born, and current U.S. law extends citizenship to anyone born to a U.S. citizen, regardless of where the birth takes place. The question is whether citizenship is the same thing as being a “natural-born citizen.””
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2015/03/23/everything-you-need-to-know-about-the-ted-cruz-birther-movement/
From the Wall Street Journal–
“In 2013, after a trip to Iowa stoked speculation about his presidential ambitions,Mr. Cruz shared his birth certificate with The Dallas Morning News. The document confirmed he’s a U.S. citizen who was born in Canada.”
http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2015/03/23/legal-experts-say-canadian-born-cruz-is-eligible-to-serve-as-president/
There’s an article at the Freedom Outpost cesspool that is just messed up from one end to the other. If you want to find it, you’re on your own.
I’ve posted this on other forums, but he was born a tri-national. Cuba can be pretty stubborn that the children of their citizens are Cuban citizens subject to their laws applicable to citizens. The Havana Interest Section of the State Dept has warnings for US citizens that Cuba may consider as their citizens, including the children of Cubans. It could be interesting if Cruz would ever consider visiting Cuba.
They do pretty well when it comes to influencing their fellow RWNJs.
I think Doc overestimates the number who will cast aside principle in this case. Certainly many will, but I believe a much larger percentage won’t, because this isn’t just some abstract bumpersticker notion like “limited government” or “free speech”: for many, if not most, it’s a product of their xenophobic “tribal” view of the world. It’s a core element of their identity.
When that other 75% of the GOP starts finding out he’s a “furriner”, he’s toast.
I believe that Ted Cruz has realized that the business of governing is hard work.
My guess is that Ted Cruz would really like a cushy job fleecing the gullible ala Sarah Palin. Mike Huckabee, Newt Gingrich, Michele Bachmann, etc.
I say this because he didn’t even bother to get tedcruz (dot) com before announcing, and look at what is there now – as of this moment, a request for support for immigration reform and support for President Obama
He didn’t get tedcruz (dot) ca (the Canadian suffix) either. I wouldn’t have expected him to get this one, but the fact that it is an anti-Cruz birther site is amusing.
Rafael Cruz is not a natural born citizen. Nothing more to add.
Here’s John T Reed’s post about it. Mostly a collection of posts from his Facebook page.
He says until the Supreme Court issues a declaratory judgement, Cruz is not eligible.
http://johntreed.com/Cruz-was-born-in-Canada.html
Folks, we’ve been had.
The birther movement has never been genuinely aimed at removing President Obama from office.
The entire birther experience has had one single objective from the beginning: To provoke Democrats into adopting and vociferously supporting the assertion that birth to a single citizen parent confers natural born citizenship to the child, regardless of his birthplace.
This was an purposeful, ingenious, incredibly prescient strategy to remove any impediment to Ted Cruz’s ascent to power, based on his Canadian birth or his Cuban parentage.
Because we the Obots have done immense amounts of research and have seen the question fully settled, we have inadvertently aided Ted Cruz and the people who wish to see him take power.
It was never about President Obama to begin with.
It would be (for this reason only) beyond funny if Cruz actually became the GOP candidate and won the general elections. Birthers would believe until after his inauguration that ANY MINUTE NOW he’d stand up and say “Just kidding, I’ve been ineligible all the time, just like Obama!”.
These people seem to think courts create reality instead of just stating what it is.
But it will be fun to see how many ballot challenges against Cruz there will be in the primaries. I can imagine a couple of faux Democrats (RWNJ birthers posing as such) challenging him so birthers can go “look, now Democrats are the birthers!”.
It’s not about Cruz, either. It’s about Phil’Ip Xaymez X’rllnanx-Smythe, born on Mars in 2069 to a US citizen and an Arcturian citizen parent, trying to run for President of the Estados Unidos of North and South America and China in 2108. He’s clearly not eligible, but the whole birther issue will have developed sufficiently by then to cover that up. Shake up, weeple!
Gee, maybe one of the nice folks at the Wall Street Journal can explain how releasing a birth certificate that shows you were born in Canada confirms someone is a U.S. citizen? Actually, the only thing Cruz did by releasing that certificate was prove he is a Canadian citizen. Then he had to go about renouncing that citizenship. So he says. I don’t think he’s ever released proof of that, either.
If Obama had to release proof of his U.S. citizenship, so should Cruz. We’re still waiting.
Obama didn’t have to. He more or less did it to humor people. And then when it didn’t, he mostly ignored it again, other than that WH correspondent’s dinner where he cracked a joke about Jon Huntsman being “born in China”
But the sad thing about the birther bills in their various forms is that they displayed a poor understanding about of Presidential eligibility or birth certificates. Several also required tracking down birth certificates for the parents of a candidate. Some of those bills would have effectively required parents to have been born in the United States. A few were more knowledgeable about US citizenship at birth and included a Consular Report of Birth Abroad. However, they often required that the document be original and subject to public inspection.
And as you stated, his Alberta birth certificate doesn’t really state that he was entitled to US citizenship at birth. It didn’t even state the ages or birthdates of his parents. It said nothing about the specific citizenship of his parents of it they met the statutory requirements to pass on US citizenship. If I looked at it quickly, assumed the stated facts were correct, and didn’t know Cruz’s history, I would point out the possibility that his mother didn’t meet the requirements to give him automatic US citizenship (like Ann Dunham if her son has been born outside the US), that she could have renounced her US citizenship, or there was the possibility that his father could have been a US citizen at birth or a naturalized US citizen meeting the statutory requirements.
Citizenship transfer is a far more complex issue than just seeing the facts on a birth certificate. I’ve been there signing one of these things, and nobody really vets the information, but takes it at face value that what a parent claims is correct.
Extremely dense of the birthers to assert that some precedent was set by Obama’s ascendancy, considering the difference in Obama and Cruz’s birth circumstances. Extremely dense indeed.
Oh. Right. Birfers.Still claiming Obama was born in Kenya no doubt LOL
I think it’s funny he had to announce at a REQUIRED event!
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/03/23/ted-cruz-liberty-university_n_6924752.html?ncid=txtlnkusaolp00000592
Nothing says Presidential more than announcing in front of a captive (or would that be captured) audience. What’s next, he going to announce his running mate to a prison audience?
Short answer, yes he did release a copy of his CRCC. I know I provided a link to it. Even Sven, of all people, conceded the issue.
For all we know, Rafael Cruz renounced his Canadian citizenship to establish his birthright citizenship in Cuba.
Taitz and Klayman featured in a USN&WR article. Of course, they say Cruz is ineligible.
http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2015/03/24/ted-cruz-inherits-birthers-with-presidential-bid
Quotes Trump as on “what we all learned in history lessons.” I still haven’t seen a single history or civics textbook, or even the author or publisher name of such a textbook, which claimed that Presidential eligibility required birth on US soil in particular, let alone to support any of the mental gymnastics needed to consider either Obama or Cruz ineligible.
That’s what makes them so furious about Cruz being eligible. Because Cruz’s mom was American, it doesn’t matter that he was born in another country. Hence why it really wouldn’t matter of Obama was born in Kenya or not. His mother was an American. It gives birthers a lot less imaginary wiggle room, when their two biggest theories are all shot to hell.
I may think Ted Cruz is a genuinely terrible human being, but I do not deny his right to run for President!
Well he still never released his kindergarten records, and still pays $X amount of dollars every day to keep them sealed. So they still have that.
Yeah, and he never did get them that picture of his second grade teacher in a zebra costume either.
Not only do I not remember what the birthers say was in textbooks, I honestly don’t remember them covering the subject one way or the other, other than to say that anyone born a citizen could become the POTUS. The focus was always on, “if you work hard and are successful, anything is possible in the United States”.
It was all about how the US is the land of opportunity for everyone.
Our child’s text books say more or less the same thing as I remember – “America is a land of opportunity”, not “here’s a treatise on the legality of who is or is not an NBC for 3rd graders”.
The conservatives keep saying that the “leftists” are the ones who are saying Cruz is ineligible. Not true. I fully admit he’s eligible, I don’t think he’s fit to lead.
I think he’s referring to the lesson that “The stuff we made up is usually more palatable, and less complicated, than the truth”.
My only issue is that in defense of Obama, some equate the situations of Cruz and Obama as the same should Obama have been born outside the United States.
Of course we’ve studied this for years, and the only correct conclusion is that Obama could have only been a natural born citizen by way of birth in the US given the particulars about his mother’s marriage to a foreign national and age.
Of course there was the shot in the dark possibility that maybe her marriage wasn’t legal because he was still married to another woman.
As I understand it, the residency requirement applied to women but not to men. I doubt that it could have survived a Constitutional challenge under the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment.
For persons born in wedlock, the requirement is the same whichever parent is the sole US citizen parent. For persons born out of wedlock, the requirements are more stringent and extensive for a US citizen father than for a US citizen mother. That imposition of a gender-based difference has survived a constitutional challenge all the way to the Supreme Court, in US v. Flores-Villar.
Oddly enough, the US citizen mother could accumulate more than enough physical presence in the United States to satisfy the presumably more stringent father’s requirement without satisfying the one-year continuous physical presence requirement for mothers.
You were probably home sick from kindergarten when they covered Minor v. Happersett.
For all we know, you are a Cuban sleeper agent whose 5 year mission is to seek out new life in old worn-out stories and plot complications.
Really, sockpuppet, where do you come up with this stuff? Haven’t we beaten this dead horse long enough? Isn’t it about time for you to start screaming “Appointments Clause” again?
Proud Americans, especially those running for President, show their birth certificate or certificate of citizenship to prove US citizenship.
Drama Queens show their Canadian birth certificate and become outraged when anyone suggests its not proof you are eligible to be President of the United States.
Yes, I’m really posting that.
Really? So Ronald Reagan wasn’t a proud American? Or George W. Bush? Or Bill Clinton? Or every other president before Barack Obama who didn’t show their birth certificate publicly and yet Obama was the only one before he was in office.
Yeah you’re really posting something so stupid.
Alas ‘Phil’, sorry ‘Svennie’, is the archetype that demonstrates “You can’t fix stupid”
Still is, although the terms are relaxed. Obama’s birth would have qualified if he were born overseas past 1986.
It was the same for a US citizen married to a foreign national.
You can check the part of that link for unmarried parents. Those are definitely ones where the child of a US citizen father is treated differently than that of a US citizen mother.
Thanks for clarifying that.
But wait, there’s more. The laws on US citizenship in Panama and the Panama Canal Zone are still in effect. The Panama Canal Zone no longer exists, so that part of the law no longer applies. However, Congress created an exception that made children born to US citizen federal employees automatic citizens at birth, if they were born in Panama.
So all the other stuff about married, unmarried, residence, etc goes out the door provided one parent is a US government employee and the birth takes place in Panama. And the strange thing is that it should still apply today. So I suppose if you could get the mom to Panama and either mom or dad is a US government employee, the kid is all set to be eligible to run for President of the United States some day.
I notice you didn’t deny being a Cuban sleeper agent.
here’s the classic obama list:
(1) the original, long-form 1961 Hawaiian birth certificate.— not released
2) Marriage license between Obama’s father (Barak Sr.) and mother (Stanley Ann Dunham)— not found, not released
3) Obama’s baptism records — sealed
4) Obama’s adoption records — sealed
5) Records of Obama’s and his mother’s reptriation as US citizens on return from Indonesia — not found, not released
6) Name change (Barry Sotero to Barack Hussein Obama) records — not found, not released
7) Noelani Elementary School (Hawaii)— not released
8) Punahou School financial aid or school records — not released
9) Occidental College financial aid records — not released.(These records were, however, subpoenaed but Obama lawyers succeeded in quashing the subpoena in court. No other Occi records have been released.)
10) Columbia College records — not released
11) Columbia senior thesis — not released
12) Harvard Law School records — not released
13) Obama’s law client list — sealed
14) Obama’s files from career as an Illinois State Senator — sealed
15) Obama’s record with Illinois State Bar Association — sealed
16) Obama’s medical records — not released
17) Obama’s passport records — not released
and now cruz:
(1) the original, long-form 1970 Canadian birth certificate.— not released
2) Marriage license between Cruz’s father and mother — not found, not released
3) Cruz’s baptism records — sealed
4) Cruz’s adoption records — sealed
5) Records of Cruz’s and his mother’s reptriation as US citizens on return from Canada — not found, not released
6) Name change (Rafael Edward Cruz to Ted Cruz) records — not found, not released
7) Elementary School (Texas)— not released
8) Faith West Academy financial aid or school records — not released
9) Princeton financial aid records — not released.
10) n/a
11) Princeton senior thesis — released
go ted.
12) Harvard Law School records — not released
13) Cruz’s law client list — sealed
14) n/a
15) Cruz’s record with Texas State Bar Association — sealed
16) Cruz’s medical records — not released
17) Cruz’s passport records — not released
Did he attend school as a foreign student?
If he hasn’t proven “no”, what are we to conclude?
…I’m sorry, are we a week early here?
he should have released everything when he announced he’s running. what is he hiding?
Birdboy is now floating the idea that Cruz was born in Cuba, and that his mother is Canadian! Citing that Cruz’s Canadian birth certificate looks funny. LOL.
At least he’s consequential and not one of the “Cruz has shown convincing evidence” crowd. The latter annoy me most because the cognitive dissonance level is off the charts.
Falcon is an equal opportunity dickhead.
My question is: if Obama had been born in Chicago to two US citizen parents, would there be Cruz birthers today?
Yes, but they would consist of a few academic types and they wouldn’t be as vocal or rabid.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/campaigns/junkie/archive/junkie070998.htm
Since the premise would not rule out “Kenyan birth” birthers (only Vattelist birthers), at least there would probably be some who would have to argue Cruz is ineligible for the same reason the hypothetical other Obama would (because born in the country would be required by them).
And you would still have the “natural = kind = race, therefore whites only” crowd who would at least in part agree that Hispanics aren’t white.
I think the obvious comparison is to how much of a furor there was over the circumstances of McCain’s birth, which is to say “almost none”.
EDIT: You know, I could have clicked on gorefan’s link before I posted. But it would have been wrong.
Of course he was born at an overseas US military base, which of course they believe (according to a common misconception) is “US soil”.
Even so, I recall the only document that McCain’s campaign allowed to be seen was his birth certificate, and in that case the reporter wasn’t allowed to handle it nor take a photo.
Thanks for that link, justlw. I’d never read that conversation before. It’s so unbelievable I have to wonder if it really happened or if that was someone’s idea of satire. In defense of my gullibility, I’ll just say I was distracted by the Levi’s ad. I kept wanting to tell the guy with the guitar to get his damn boots off the love seat!
Well… that version was kinda sorta what we’d have to call “almost totally made up”.
I was under the edit timer gun, and that was the first link that came up when I searched for that line. With just a few seconds left, I thought “Oh, what the heck,” mainly because I thought it had at least captured the famous line from Nixon — “We could do it, that’s for sure; but it would be wrong” — and the fake story that the writer wrapped around it was at least somewhat humorous.
So now I’ve gone back and done a little research, and discovered that, much to my surprise… Nixon didn’t actually say this!
The person who actually originally related this was Haldeman, while testifying at the Watergate hearings. He even said he’d gone back to the tapes to jog his memory, and yup, that’s sure what his boss had said. Said he.
But he was — and I know this is going to be a shock — not telling the truth.
What Nixon actually said began with: “You could get a million dollars. You could get it in cash. I know where it could be gotten. It is not easy, but it could be done.”
This is where Haldeman claimed his boss then pointed out that gee, guess we can’t do that because it would be wrong and all.
But he didn’t. Nixon rambled on for another eight pages’ worth of transcript about how hush money might be raised, capping it off with a discussion of whether they could then give up the real prize that would have to go with the money: clemency.
His conclusion: No, the president couldn’t be seen to be giving clemency to people involved with this, because it would look bad. That’s what would be “wrong”, in his mind. Not the morality: the optics.
A (real) story about this: “Tapes Show Nixon Weighed Pros and Cons of Hush Money”
I don’t know if you noticed but that Mc Cain article was from 1998.
Here is an even older one (but not for McCain).
[Hyperlink fixed. Doc.]
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=9E02E4DD1238E733A25757C1A9679C946597D6CF
I didn’t!
Link doesn’t work!
Try this one
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=9E02E4DD1238E733A25757C1A9679C946597D6CF
That did the trick.
So, another son of a military hero, born on foreign soil — but this time while his parents were merely vacationing abroad.
I’d say you’d have to really be splitting hairs to not consider him “natural born”, and apparently his party agreed, as he at least made it on the first ballot at the 1904 DNC.
My takeaway from that is that the issue of foreign born citizens at birth keeps coming up. The lower courts who looked at Obama and McCain in 2008 were not willing to go out on a limb and say fore sure that McCain was eligible. (McCain was a really complicated situation.) I think a Supreme Court decision on Cruz would be a good thing.
While a SCOTUS decision would be a good thing, it is also unlikely. SCOTUS isn’t going to take a case just to affirm Cruz’s eligibility.
SCOTUS will only hear a Cruz case if (1) it is filed (2) competently (i.e., by someone who has standing, knows how to state a claim, and it isn’t unripe or moot), (3) Cruz is found to be ineligible, and (4) a federal circuit court or state court of last resort affirms the finding of ineligibility.
I’m no Lord Monckton, but the odds of all those circumstances happening are very low.
I’m trying to figure out why having the Supreme Court rule on it is going to make any difference, when Ark is over a hundred years old and there are still people arguing it doesn’t mean what the court said it meant, what makes anyone think they will be any less vague. I’m sorry but I don’t see even a flat out declaration, which isn’t likely to happen, satisfying those who do not want to accept it.
Well, the petition and the oral arguments will specifically ask them to make it “less vague”. E.g., does the fact that the Wong Court let the lower court ruling stand really mean that they were affirming that Wong was an NBC for eligibility purposes? Was not stating it explicitly simply an oversight? Is the statutory grant of citizenship to foreign-born Americans really a form of “naturalization”? Or is the belief that anyone who’s a “citizen from birth” is an NBC correct?
It seems to me that those are legitimate points of controversy, some of which have implications beyond presidential eligibility, that are worthy of the Court’s attention.
And what makes you think that it will make any difference. I’ve read any number of court opinions that proceeded from a simple premise, and that the decision was so verbose and overwrought that by the end of it you didn’t know any more than when you started. I don’t see the pattern changing here, particularly with the current court who can write for pages and pages and say nothing of consequence. Always assuming they would even touch it to begin with, which I don’t, and since no one has gotten even close to getting an issue before the courts I don’t much see it happening.
To me, this is all about who is filing the lawsuits. If it is a competent attorney (Stern at the Fogbow, for instance) a case would be filed on the behalf of a plaintiff with standing, to a court with jurisdiction to hear the dispute, asking for a remedy within the court’s power to grant and with a well-research and plausible legal theory as to Rafael’s ineligibility. The court would then rule on the merits and it could be appealed up the chain (whomever lost). Once it got to SCOTUS, even denying cert without comment would put the matter to rest for good (or until the SCOTUS changed its mind).
On the other hand, if a birther (say Mario Apuzzo) were to do it, no thought would be given to addressing standing issues—this would be by design to avoid the case being judged on its merits, thus further enabling the meme that the court didn’t actually decide the issue they just disposed of the case. Furthermore, the arguments would be hamstrung by the attempt to conflate Rafael’s eligibility with President Obama’s. Because it’s no good upholding the Constitution if you can’t smear President Obama and saying he isn’t really a usurper is even worse. Add in how the multitude of birther theories will muddy the water and tend to marginalize even serious questioning of Cruz’s natural born status and you’ll have a good carnival side show with nothing to show for it in the end.
I respectfully disagree.
If Cruz’s eligibility was competently litigated, his eligibility affirmed by a federal circuit court or state court of last resort, and SCOTUS denied cert., that would not put the matter to rest … in the minds of birthers. As birthers did with President Obama, they would then imagine scenarios to explain away the cert. denial. Some birthers have even said they would ignore an adverse on-the-merits ruling from SCOTUS.
I have to agree with Bob on this, anymore than the court refusing cert on all the SS marriage issues did, or the string of losses by the birthers on their issues all the way up to the Supreme Court ended that issue.