RNC Chair Refuses to Say Whether Ted Cruz is Eligible to be President
Source: Mediate
In an interview with TIME magazine, Republican National Chairman Reince Priebus refused to say whether or not he thought Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz was eligible to be president.
“A topic in the news today: Ted Cruz was born in Canada,” TIME asked. “Is he constitutionally eligible to be President?”
But Priebus shot down the question. “Listen, I don’t get involved,” he said.
“I’m not going to get in the middle of all these candidate issues. It’s a bad place for me to be,” he added. “I’ll let all these folks argue about this stuff, and I’m going to stay out of it.”
Read more: http://www.mediaite.com/online/rnc-chair-refuses-to-say-whether-ted-cruz-is-eligible-to-be-president/
Ah, the sweet smell of schadenfreude!
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yeoman6987
(14,449 posts)Cruz is a snake but I want him to be exposed by his nasty believes in how our country should run rather then where he was born and had no control over. Either way I hope he loses.
Hortensis
(58,785 posts)in favor of, I imagine, Rubio.
jmowreader
(53,006 posts)Because Cruz has a parent who was an American citizen at the time he was born, he's a native-born citizen and therefore constitutionally eligible to be president. Priebus' problem is guys like Donald Trump and Joe Arpaio dug a hole so deep over President Obama's birthplace (which was actually IN the United States), it's going to be nearly impossible to explain away a presidential candidate who really was born in a foreign country.
Funny thing tho: this wasn't an issue when the Panamanian-born John McCain was running.
lobodons
(1,290 posts)Is there a difference between Native born and Natural born (should come down to what the Framer's intent was. I am sure there is documentation on what their meaning was meant to be somewhere i someone's notes)
And also, since courts have ruled that at very least natural born = being born on American soil which includes over seas military bases and territory (which covers McCain since he was born on an American base in Panama)
jmowreader
(53,006 posts)is someone with no American heritage becoming president. About 99 percent of the Constitution has to be read between the lines. (The Third Amendment is pretty damn clear, but everything else hinges on what angle you hold it at.)
randys1
(16,286 posts)worse than we beat the trump
Hortensis
(58,785 posts)in real doubt, so I also imagine the damage here is to his potential following. Having this trumpeted is looking as if it may be a real problem. Such a shame. 
Randys1, I'd be with you, but then I truly thought W's enormous deficiencies, manifest incompetence, and background negatives would turn off a critical number of "good" conservatives. Boy, was I completely wrong.
I've been watching for a truly dangerous right-wing candidate for a long time, and Cruz has been for some time my guess as the scariest in decades.
Now, though, that smooth-spoken snake, John Kasich, is potentially another huge danger with his background of authoritarian, corporatist, neofascist policies and his overtures to the religious right. How'd you like his proposal for a government agency to promote Judeo-Christian values?
In any case, I really want them both to lose the primary. They're both already far, far too close to the White House for safety.
former9thward
(33,424 posts)leftynyc
(26,060 posts)There are only two forms of citizenship - natural born and naturalized. If teddy never went through naturalization, he's a natural born citizen (which I believe he is). With the birther nonsense trying to create other categories of citizens, this issue has gotten distorted beyond all reason.
pocoloco
(3,180 posts)One way that citizenship can be lost is by voting in a foreign election.
leftynyc
(26,060 posts)I had not heard that. That certainly would change things. Frankly I think he's done after the last debate. That NY values line may play well with his base but the establishment would shoot him before they'd let him get the nod. They would actually rather have Donald.
VMA131Marine
(5,200 posts)He clearly had dual allegiance for a long time. I actually think there is enough uncertainty about Cruz' status that SCOTUS would be setting a new precedent if it were to rule him an NBC as a result of a natural born citizenship challenge. A big question would be who would have standing to file such a challenge. All the Obama citizenship challenges died on issues related to standing, not that the cases had any merits even if they had gotten that far.
McCain was born in the Canal zone to two US citizen parents, one of whom was on military active duty. Even so the Republicans in Congress were compelled to pass a sense of the Senate resolution that declared him to be an NBC. It probably wasn't necessary and wasn't legally binding anyway.
murielm99
(32,837 posts)challenge his citizenship. They could refuse to seat him if he is elected.
States can also refuse to put him on the ballot. From what I can see, that has not worked so far. The courts are not going along with it at this time.
former9thward
(33,424 posts)It was introduced by two Democrats, Patrick Leahy and Clair McCaskill. It was passed unanimously.
pnwmom
(110,219 posts)former9thward
(33,424 posts)Thor_MN
(11,843 posts)The Panama Canal Zone was a territory of the United States until 1979. McCain's father undoubtedly was based in the Panama Canal Zone, not Panama itself.
former9thward
(33,424 posts)Maybe you know what is in her mind, I don't.
Thor_MN
(11,843 posts)What you said was not untrue, but was not relevant to McCain's birthplace.
Maybe you didn't understand the topic at hand?
former9thward
(33,424 posts)More birther crap and by the same people who used to attack it when it was used against Obama. Simple as that. And BTW McCain was born at a hospital outside the canal zone. Should he be sent back to Panama?
Thor_MN
(11,843 posts)McCain's version is that the birth took place at Coco Solo Military Hospital in the Canal Zone. Others speculate that is was a hospital in Panama. So clearly you understanding is questionable.
The main point is you chose to answer a poorly worded question correctly, but in a manner that was not relevant to the topic.
former9thward
(33,424 posts)Until Democratic Senators Claire McCaskill and Patrick Leahy introduced a resolution saying McCain was eligible. It passed unanimously. Then people shut up about it.
With questions - however serious - about whether Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., is eligible to run for president since he was born outside U.S. borders on an American Naval base, Sens. Patrick Leahy, D-Vermont, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo. today introduced a non-binding resolution expressing the sense of the U.S. Senate that McCain qualifies as a "natural born Citizen," as specified in the Constitution and eligible for the highest office in the land.
Co-sponsors include Sens. Hillary Clinton, D-NY, and Barack Obama, D-Illinois; Leahy said he anticipates it will pass unanimously.
http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2008/04/legislation-int.html
Reter
(2,188 posts)Technically, it was US soil.
A Simple Game
(9,214 posts)But if I remember right, at the time there was some question as to whether he was born on the base of in a hospital off the base. But either way it shouldn't have mattered.
tclambert
(11,187 posts)Someone found both his parents listed on Canadian voter registration rolls a few years after his birth. http://www.mediaite.com/online/ted-cruzs-mom-listed-as-eligible-to-vote-in-canada-on-recently-surfaced-document/ That could mean they were NOT American citizens at that time. It is still not clear if they claimed Canadian citizenship before he was born. So it may not be as clear cut as originally thought.
It was briefly an issue for McCain, but the Senate addressed it, ruled him eligible because he was born on an American military base (Coco Solo Naval Air Station) in an American-administered territory (Panama Canal Zone) to American parents. Still, the Senate felt the need to specifically make a statement on the issue. And no one questioned it further.
CanonRay
(16,034 posts)He is naturalized by birth, not "natural born". Please see this article:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/ted-cruz-is-not-eligible-to-be-president/2016/01/12/1484a7d0-b7af-11e5-99f3-184bc379b12d_story.html?tid=sm_fb
dixiegrrrrl
(60,148 posts)His father.....named on the birth certificate...had no idea he was Cruz's father.
Wilson, who has never previously spoken about his past with the news media, told McClatchy in a telephone interview from London that he did not realize he was connected to the U.S. Texas senator, however indirect.
He didn’t realize that his first wife, Eleanor, whose maiden name is Darragh, had such a well-known son, whose citizenship is at issue in the presidential campaign, or that “Wilson” is on the birth certificate.
TheCowsCameHome
(40,270 posts)Hasn't he been hiding in a cave for the last six months?
Ikonoklast
(23,973 posts)
valerief
(53,235 posts)If not you, who? If not now, when?
tomm2thumbs
(13,297 posts)
I'm guessing he is a covert spy planted by Castro....
CANADA, we'll keep Bieber if you take back Cruz
LastLiberal in PalmSprings
(13,286 posts)Has anyone told Flo?
"Where is your husband?"
A Simple Game
(9,214 posts)katmondoo
(6,523 posts)my fathers' family was from Quebec
Thor_MN
(11,843 posts)Why did it take almost a month to get documented? It took 9 days to get the form filled out and three weeks more to get it signed?
dbackjon
(6,578 posts)Which is what Cruz favors, he is ineligible.
Of course Tribe doesn't believe in that interpretation
But the irony is that a Justice Cruz would rule against a candidate Cruz.
suston96
(4,175 posts)...and whether she retained her citizenship by living outside the country before baby Cruz was born....
And whether she met other Immigration and Naturalization stipulations regarding derived citizenship.
Such as where and when did she report the birth of her son to the appropriate US Immigration and Naturalization services - if at all.
I was born in Italy of an Italian mother and an American father.
My father met all the obligatories including residence and registering my birth at the American Consulate and including me on his American passport. (Which I still have and used to verify my own derived citizenship).
Here is the general link to US citizenship and immigration services: http://www.uscis.gov/us-citizenship/citizenship-through-parents
Good luck.
DhhD
(4,695 posts)Immigration Office. Both Canadian and American forms had to be presented to the Canadians within about 18 months from birth. In the early 70s, the Cold War was still a big thing so it was quite a serious matter than the fewer forms needed in the late 1980s. Today, it takes the N-600 form (computers verify the needed information).
LTG
(216 posts)when I registered to vote I listed myself as "Native Born" on my registration form. The only other choice was "Naturalized". The registration office called me and told me they had changed the choice to "Naturalized", the only other choice. At the time of my birth, February 1953, my father was serving as an officer and pilot in the U.S, Army, having been rotated to Japan with his Division after flying in combat in Korea.
Not long after that I received a letter from Immigration ordering me to appear before the head of the Immigration office in Seattle. Failure to appear with my parents, their proofs of citizenship, my birth certificate, and proof of length and dates of my actual residence in the U.S. Failure to appear would lead to my arrest and deportation.
At the meeting the local head of Immigration questioned me, and my parents, individually and under oath. During these interrogations he reviewed the documents as they related to his questions.
He explained that not all military bases are considered U.S. soil. That was usually covered under the Status of Forces agreements and Camp Crawford in Sapporo, Japan. Further, even if it were found to be a citizen, I was required to physically reside in the U.S. for a certain amount of time before a certain age or be subject to possible loss of citizenship.
After the entire ordeal the official told me that he had determined that I was a citizen at birth by virtue of my parents being determined to be U.S. citizens at the time of my birth. He had me raise my right hand and administered an oath of citizenship and the Immigration Department issued a Naturalization Certificate.
Citizenship laws have changed a number of times over the last 100 years. At that time he informed me that my own classification of citizenship prohibited me from running for President. Not sure why he thought to mention that in particular of it was even true, but he did say it.
ETA - My birth had been reported to the Consulate on the State Department's form and I was added to my mother's passport for travel back to the U.S.
lark
(25,962 posts)Good old Cruzie, reaping what he's sowed. Couldn't happen to a more deserving person. 
TheFarseer
(9,761 posts)Sucks when you don't like either of your top 2 candidates.
TeamPooka
(25,577 posts)
hughee99
(16,113 posts)That's a good idea, we should try that next time.
nxylas
(6,440 posts)What a novel idea.
Dont call me Shirley
(10,998 posts)Spitfire of ATJ
(32,723 posts)Silent_Greene
(19 posts)*TYT: Ted Cruz May Not Be Eligible For President After All
John Poet
(2,510 posts)of the Republican party, doesn't it?
But after all the birther crap leveled at Obama,
who actually WAS born in this country,
the GOP deserves the waters to be as muddied as they can get
over Cruz.
In my opinion, he's not eligible. He wasn't born in the US or US territory.
I'll be happy to beat that drum loud and long, if it begins to look like he'll be their nominee.
It's simple justice to give them back what they gave us, in spades,
and in this case, there's more of a case to be made.
olddad56
(5,732 posts)
restorefreedom
(12,655 posts)they are trying desperately to sandbag the top two so they can get their lapdog jebbie or rubio in.
i am so happy they are failing miserably. not cuz i like trump or cruz, because THIS is the election where the establishment loses power on both sides.
its a revolution, folks
mrmpa
(4,033 posts)should a person be eligible for the Presidency if he has given up his citizenship of another country within 2 years of running for President. I don't care whether his Canadian citizenship is seen as "benign". But someone who carried dual citizenship into adulthood and only gave it up after winning a position as Senator's seat, should not be eligible if not in the eyes of the law, at least in the eyes of voters to be President.
mdbl
(8,291 posts)and he wasn't born here, that's not up for debate. I love how repuglicans scream laws and constitution when it suits them, and pretends the same laws don't apply to them.
