Stop me if you heard this before, Donald Trump does not think that someone running for president is from this country. Well this time he is not questioning President Obama, but his aim is at his chief rival in the GOP Presidential polls, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz. Trump said of Cruz’s birthplace and citizenship in an interview with the Washington Post. “It’d be a very precarious one for Republicans because he’d be running and the courts may take a long time to make a decision. You don’t want to be running and have that kind of thing over your head.” Meanwhile, conservative commentator Ann Coulter, who has been supporting Donald Trump for president, backed her candidate and declared that Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) is not a natural born U.S. citizen. She went on Twitter to make her point.
Same lawyers who said anchor babies are in the Constitution now tell us being born outside U.S to 1 American parent = natural born citizen.
— Ann Coulter (@AnnCoulter) January 6, 2016
NYT: Cruz was born outside the U.S. to 1 American parent: “Under the Constitution this makes him a ‘natural born citizen.’” Absolutely false
— Ann Coulter (@AnnCoulter) January 6, 2016
There has been plenty of talk about if Cruz is a United States citizen and few dispute that he is. Cruz was born in Calgary, Canada, in 1970 while his parents were working in the oil industry. Though his dad is from Cuba, his mother was a U.S. citizen, having been born in Delaware. Cruz held dual U.S. and Canadian citizenship, though he renounced the latter in 2014.
For those who still doubt that Cruz is a United States citizen lets go to NPR’s Domenico Montanaro who explained how there should be no question that he is an American.
“The U.S. Constitution says presidential candidates have to be ‘natural-born citizens.’ But the Supreme Court has never weighed in with a definition, leaving it open to interpretation.
“It’s a question that has come up before. In 2008, senators passed a resolution, making it clear, for example, that John McCain was allowed to run given that he was born on a U.S. military base in the Panama Canal Zone. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, both senators then, voted for it.
“Barry Goldwater, the 1964 GOP nominee, was born in Arizona when it was a territory — not a state. And some questioned George Romney’s eligibility to run in 1968, because he was born in Mexico. Romney’s parents were U.S. residents.”
A couple of former men very familiar with the situation side with Cruz in the matter. Paul Clement, the solicitor general under for President George W. Bush and his successor Neal Katyal who held the same post in the Obama administration came together to pen an article for the Harvard Law Review.
The duo agreed that “there is no question “Cruz is eligible and furthermore, “Cruz has been a citizen from birth and is thus a ‘natural born Citizen’ within the meaning of the Constitution” and the “Naturalization Act of 1790.”
Earlier this fall Trump himself was not buying the idea that Cruz was not a citizen.
“I hear it was checked out by every attorney and every which way, and I understand Ted is in fine shape,” Trump told ABC News last September of his rival’s constitutional eligibility because of his birthplace.
Well for his part Cruz has laughed off the suggestion he’s not eligible for the White House, taking to Twitter on Tuesday to post a link from the television show “Happy Days” that shows the character Fonzie jumping his motorcycle over a shark.
