Cruz says Canadian birth does not block him from presidency

Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, campaigns at Penny’s Diner in Missouri Valley, Iowa.

Trump told the Washington Post in an interview published Tuesday that Cruz’s Canadian birthplace and his holding a double passport was a “very precarious” issue that “a lot of people are talking about”.

In 2011, the billionaire businessman made headlines when he questioned President Obama’s citizenship, suggesting that Mr. Obama was not born in the United States. At a campaign stop on Wednesday, however, Cruz noted that the question has been asked and answered about presidential candidates several times before and that children born overseas to American citizens are legally naturalized citizens. Cruz shrugged off the Trump’s changed position with a tweet linking to a “Happy Days” video showing Fonzie jumping the shark.

“There’s the invisible campaign which is the ground game, the organizing, recruiting your volunteers, training them, making every contingency plan available, can we get rides for people who can’t get to the polls”, said Pollster Dr. Tim Vercellotti, Director of the Western New England University Polling Institute. “Ted Cruz is your guy”, the narrator says over footage of Cruz reading to his daughters, a reference to the frontrunner’s repeated use of Dr. Seuss on the national stage.

The constitution says only “natural born” citizens can be elected president, but many legal scholars say that the birthplace is irrelevant if someone is a citizen through parentage. She could, he said, have taken an eminent clerkship or joined a major law firm and set out to make big money.

But Senator Cruz renounced his Canadian citizenship in 2014 – which required him to submit a formal document to the Canadian government.

Trump’s first ad focuses on security and immigration issues.

“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”, Trump said of Cruz, noting that Cruz wouldn’t want that “hanging over his head”. You know, I’m building a wall, but I want people to come in.

The closest the Supreme Court came to addressing the issue is when it ruled in 1971 with Rogers v. Bellei that a person born to an American parent outside the USA and granted citizenship at birth can have that citizenship revoked if he or she doesn’t fulfill the residency requirements.

John McCain faced the same question, as did Barry Goldwater, George Romney, and Chester A. Arthur. Trump is just too much of a wild card and an outsider.

“I hear it was checked out by every attorney and every which way and I understand Ted is in fine shape”, he told the network then. During a New Year’s Eve conference call with volunteers, Cruz warned his supporters to expect attack ads to start piling on. Trump has questioned how Cruz’s evangelical Christian faith fits with his Cuban heritage and criticized his opposition to ethanol subsidies.

“Not as high as you would gather from the press – I would say the chance of Trump or Carson winning is probably 10% or lower”, Silver said at an event at Barnard University in NY in mid-November, referring to Trump and retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson. “Nothing against Canada”, Cruz said, “but I’m an American by birth and as a USA senator, I believe I should be only an American”.