Natural-born citizen
Who is a natural-born citizen? Who, in other words, is a citizen at birth, such that that person can be a President someday?
The 14th Amendment defines citizenship this way: "All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside." But even this does not get specific enough. As usual, the Constitution provides the framework for the law, but it is the law that fills in the gaps.
Currently, Title 8 of the U.S. Code fills in those gaps. Section 1401 defines the following as people who are "citizens of the United States at birth:"
Anyone born inside the United States
Any Indian or Eskimo born in the United States, provided being a citizen of the U.S. does not impair the person's status as a citizen of the tribe
Any one born outside the United States, both of whose parents are citizens of the U.S., as long as one parent has lived in the U.S.
Any one born outside the United States, if one parent is a citizen and lived in the U.S. for at least one year and the other parent is a U.S. national
Any one born in a U.S. possession, if one parent is a citizen and lived in the U.S. for at least one year
Any one found in the U.S. under the age of five, whose parentage cannot be determined, as long as proof of non-citizenship is not provided by age 21
Any one born outside the United States, if one parent is an alien and as long as the other parent is a citizen of the U.S. who lived in the U.S. for at least five years (with military and diplomatic service included in this time)
A final, historical condition: a person born before 5/24/1934 of an alien father and a U.S. citizen mother who has lived in the U.S.
Anyone falling into these categories is considered natural-born, and is eligible to run for President or Vice President. These provisions allow the children of military families to be considered natural-born, for example.
I recall a recent discussion on NPR (at the time there was an Arnold driven consideration of changing the Constitution) about this issue.
According to the "legal scholars" interviewed by NPR, the US Supreme Court has never specifically ruled as to whether natural born means born on US soil and whether, if so, there is an exception for children of military personnel or of two US citizens living abroad.
Apparently it's an open question, and since the Supreme Court does not rule on hypothetical cases, we may never know unless someone in McCain's position is elected.
An easy way to look at it too is if the baby born outside the USA qualifies at birth for an American passport. My baby did and he could be President one day, though there would need to be more video gaming in the WH before he would take the job (he is 13 now).
Strange they checked McCain but not Obama who was the one that was really in question.
I believe you are confusing “citizen” with “natural born citizen”, they are not the same thing. Both parents must be citizens at the time of the child’s birth and must be born in the United States or a territory of the USA to be “natural born”.
A good example of a person that is not a natural born citizen is Barry Soetoro, AKA\Barrack Obama. His father was never a citizen and it is also thought he was born in Kenya as he has hidden all documentation concerning his birth, this is highly likely. The only document he has supplied was proven to be forged from his half-sister’s certificate of live birth. The first post that contained the photoshop forgery evidence was pulled and the fake document rescanned and posted without the traces of forgery. The document was certified by a organization owned and run by criminal scammer George Soros. Barry stated in a book ghost written by Bill Ayers that he possesses his original birth certificate but refuses to release it and has spent nearly two million dollars in attorney fees to keep it hidden. Hopefully a judge somewhere has the courage to issue a discovery order. Barry has not publicly stated any legitimate reason for sealing his records from the American People but it is obvious to anybody with a brain that he is hiding something very incriminating. One man was shot in the head outside a DC church after he decided to cooperate in an investigation concerning the removal of documents from Obama’s passport records. I believe somebody deleted the original long form birth certificate from Barry’s passport files.
It is obvious that Barry will do anything including murder to keep his documents secret. I believe the people of the USA should have access to this information to verify that Barry is eligible to hold the office of president. Hawaii says the people of the United States are not persons of interest when it comes to the “president’s” birth certificate. I believe officials there have also been threatened along with judges presiding over the court cases involving this matter. It seems they all would rather continue to live than uphold their oath of office to defend the constitution of the United States.
This is what happens when we elect criminals to government positions. It is time we elect all new members of congress. Do not vote for whoever runs the most commercials and the corrupt lame-stream media tells you to vote for. Our congress is 95% criminals and traitors, if we don’t clean house next election, our nation will be lost forever.