utbagpiper
Banned
The "Canadian Voters' Registry" has been thoroughly explained in most media as roughly equal to a quick and dirty census of who lived at each home, with no attempt to determine citizenship or other eligibility to actually vote. They were compiled with door-to-door visits, asking anyone who answered the door, the names of who lived at the home. This is meaningless for determining whether Cruz's mother retained her US citizenship or not. Even providing this link shows someone who is looking for excuses and has made his mind up, rather than someone looking for relevant data.
This entire article begs the question. If Cruz is a natural born citizen, he has no "naturalization papers" to show, and wouldn't need to show them to hold or retain a Senate seat.
As for when he officially renounced his Canadian citizenship, that is entirely irrelevant to whether he is a natural born US citizen. Had he renounced at 17 or 25, rather than 44, nothing relative to his natural born status would change. It is entirely possible for a child to enjoy dual, natural born status, depending on the laws of both nations. Indeed, it may be possible that Cruz would have been considered a citizen from birth by three nations: Cuba as a result of his father's citizenship, USA as a result of his mother's citizenship, and Canada as a result of being born there. See "jus sanguinis" vs "jus soli".
Another article that begs a lot of questions, and gets facts wrong. The article claims that those born abroad to US parents get an "abbreviated form or naturalization" and are therefore not natural born citizens.
The article also asserts that Cruz can't be natural born because Canada gave him citizenship at a time when they banned dual citizenship. This amounts to saying that because Canada (like the US and other nations) was sloppy about making sure they didn't grant citizenship in violation of their own rules against dual citizenship, the grantee forfeited his natural born status to US citizenship. Or, put another way, some birthers have tried to use "dual citizenship" against Obama. These claims have been roundly refuted.
What we have here, beebobby, are three cases of extreme confirmation bias on your part. Very weak intellectually.
Is this because you care so much about adhering to the constitutional requirement that you demanded the same of Obama's birth certificate?
Or is it because you want tit for tat against the birthers?
Or are you simply showing some rather severe hypocrisy?
If you want to advocate that all candidates for US President demonstrate their eligibility, that is a fine standard. But current "innocent until proven guilty" might suggest that it would be incumbent on detractors to demonstrate ineligibility rather than having candidates try to prove eligibility.
Under the laws in place at the time, Cruz inherited US natural born citizenship status from his mother, regardless of where he was born unless his mother had renounced her US citizenship prior to his birth. Renouncing US citizenship generally requires a very affirmative and intentional act. Merely applying for citizenship of another nation is not sufficient; not even if that nation requires one to renounce all other obligations. To wit, the US State Department provides the following:
THE IMMIGRATION & NATIONALITY ACT
Section 349(a)(5) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) (8 U.S.C. 1481(a)(5)) is the section of law governing the right of a United States citizen to renounce his or her U.S. citizenship. That section of law provides for the loss of nationality by voluntarily
"(5) making a formal renunciation of nationality before a diplomatic or consular officer of the United States in a foreign state , in such form as may be prescribed by the Secretary of State".
B. ELEMENTS OF RENUNCIATION
A person wishing to renounce his or her U.S. citizenship must voluntarily and with intent to relinquish U.S. citizenship:
1.appear in person before a U.S. consular or diplomatic officer,
2.in a foreign country (normally at a U.S. Embassy or Consulate); and
3.sign an oath of renunciation
Renunciations that do not meet the conditions described above have no legal effect. Because of the provisions of Section 349(a)(5), U.S. citizens cannot effectively renounce their citizenship by mail, through an agent, or while in the United States. In fact, U.S. courts have held certain attempts to renounce U.S. citizenship to be ineffective on a variety of grounds, as discussed below.
The entire "birther" thing (that seems to have started from the Hillary Clinton campaign some 8 years ago) was rather quickly tiresome, small minded, and frankly stupid. That Obama allowed it to drag out so long, rather than releasing some documents or admitting he may have been "creative" in applying for college scholarships was either very foolish of him...or clever like a fox as some of his critics looked like tin-foil-hat wearing loons.
On the practical level, if we were to suddenly find 100% irrefutable proof that Obama was NOT natural born, what would we do at this point other than elevate Biden to president for 364 days? Is every law, ever budget, ever pardon signed by Obama void? Supreme and other federal court appointments void and thus decisions issued by those courts void? Obama was natural born US Citizen. And even if he weren't, there is no way to undo 7 years of governance. Obama's problem is not his natural born status; it is his overt hostility to the culture into which he was natural born, but which he hates.
If someone has some real evidence that Cruz's mother voluntarily and legally surrendered her US Citizenship prior to Cruz's birth, or that Cruz has voluntarily surrendered his US citizenship since then, by all means we ought to see it.
Until then, the crackpots are simply showing how scared they are that Cruz might actually have the popular/electoral support needed to win and govern.
Charles
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