Election Commission Will Hear Complaints Over Eligibility Issues Of Ted Cruz And Marco Rubio

The Indiana media is scoffing at eligibility challenges made to the presidential candidacies of Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio which will be heard by the Indiana Election Commission. I should point out that no properly-briefed formal challenge has been filed with the Commission. There's just a one-page letter filed by an 85-year old Madison man and one filed by perennial gadfly candidate Bob Kern. "Most legal scholars agree that Cruz and Rubio meet the U.S. Constitution’s eligibility requirement," the Indianapolis Star writes.

Regardless of what these so-called legal scholars are now saying, constitutional law was very clear when I was growing up that persons born abroad, particularly a person like Ted Cruz whose father is not a U.S. citizen, would never have been considered a natural born citizen. Cruz was born in Calgary, Canada to a U.S. citizen mother and a Cuban father. He was a natural born Canadian citizen, who was completely unaware of the fact he held Canadian citizenship until it was brought to his attention more than a year ago, at which point he formally renounced his Canadian citizenship. If you doubt me when I contend there are serious legal concerns about Cruz's eligibility, check out this fact pattern recently shared by an attorney about a Canadian-born person who went through life mistakenly believing he was a U.S. citizen until told otherwise by federal authorities:

I have a client whose dad was born in the US and mom born in Alberta Canada. Client was born in 1951 in Canada and moved to Indiana in March of 1956 when he was 5. Of course he has nothing from crossing the border as this wasn't needed at the time. Client has been here his whole life since age 5. Mom and dad divorced a few years later and he believes she naturalized at that time but lost contact with his mom and knows very little about her. Both parents are now deceased. 

Client went to replace his SS card a few years ago and was told no because he was not a citizen. Client wants to retire. He tried to file for a birth abroad but would have had to do that before he turned 18 he was told (years before the new law made this an issue with Canadian citizens) and he was denied a passport.

Here's what you should understand that our lying news media will never explain to you. The U.S. Constitution confers no natural born citizenship status on Cruz. The only persons clearly conferred that status at birth are those born within the jurisdiction of the U.S. Some argue an additional requirement that your parents also be U.S. citizens to make you a natural born citizen. Marco Rubio was born in Miami; however, both of his parents were Cuban citizens holding permanent U.S. resident status at the time of his birth, both of whom later became naturalized citizens. The 14th Amendment confers citizenship on Rubio at birth. Whether that also means he's a natural born citizen is up for debate. The 14th Amendment by its express words makes him only a citizen, not a natural born citizen.

Ted Cruz, on the other hand, could only be considered a citizen if his mother had resided for a minimum period of 10 years following her 14th birthday in the U.S. before giving birth to him in Canada. If Cruz' mother could establish proof of her U.S. citizenship and the 10-year residency requirement, a statute enacted by Congress permitted her to register with the State Department the birth of her son born abroad, allowing him to be statutorily-conferred naturalized citizenship status by the act of recording that notice. If she had failed to do so, the U.S. government presumes under this country's laws that his parents intended him to be a Canadian citizen only. In Cruz's case, his mother timely recorded his birth born abroad and allowed him to become a citizen. As you can see from the fact pattern shown above, a Canadian-born person who had one U.S. citizen parent and one Canadian parent did not become a naturalized citizen because his parents' failed to record his birth born abroad in a timely fashion, notwithstanding the fact he's lived in the U.S. since he was five years of age.

Nobody argues the fact that Ted Cruz was a dual citizen at birth. It is my belief that a person born owing allegiance to two different countries cannot under any circumstances be considered a natural born citizen of both countries. The Indiana Election Commission will turn down both of these pointless challenges filed against Cruz and Rubio today. Neither are properly briefed or being argued by persons learned in the law, but that probably wouldn't matter anyway. Like so many other provisions of the U.S. Constitution, because it's too difficult to amend, those charged with interpreting it simply read it to mean what they want it to mean, regardless of the framers' original intent. At that point, the Constitution becomes meaningless. We're now ruled by decree as the late Justice Antonin Scalia lamented in one of his more recent dissenting opinions. The rule of law mandated by our U.S. Constitution has become meaningless.

UPDATE: The Commission voted 4-0 to deny the challenge made against Rubio and 3-1 in the challenge made against Cruz. The longest-serving commission member, Tony Long, said he was sure based on his legal training that Cruz wasn't a natural born citizen, but he inexplicably voted to deny the challenge after moments before claiming it was the most difficult decision he faced in his many years on the Commission.