It's Time for Congress to Pass the 'John McCain Rule'

A year after the election and the Democrats, the media, establishment Republicans are still apoplectic over the inauguration of President Donald Trump. 

It’s obvious they hate him.  When did the media stop looking at Donald Trump as an entertainment figure and begin to loathe him?  True, bat-guano, off-the-charts loathing.  The answer, of course, is when Donald Trump challenged President Obama to produce a birth certificate.

Even today, few things get a liberal Democrat or the media more riled up than questioning President Obama’s qualifications to be president.  It’s almost (but not quite) the same level of hate and disgust as they reserve for climate deniers whom they want to strip their citizenship, stuff in a boxcar, and shuffle them to a gulag.  Conservatives and Republicans have learned to just “not go there.”  No good could ever come from even a rational discussion.

Isn’t the liberal hysteria a case of: They doth protest too much, methinks.  What is the source of their hatred that they would do something like hiring a third party to generate a phony document in order to get back at and unseat the president?

Outside the myth-making and propaganda-making apparatus that is the media, President Obama’s story has rarely been told—without spin.  Why is there even a question—isn’t it “settled science” since a birth certificate was produced?  Wasn’t it all about the birth certificate?  No.

Born in America (Hawaii) of a foreign father (a British subject before Kenya gained their independence) and an American mother, any lawyer in the (now defunct) Immigration & Naturalization Service would have said of the infant, “Per the U.S. Constitution, Little Barack is an American citizen.”  Also, per the father’s country’s constitution, Little Barack is also a British subject or Kenyan citizen—pick one.  That is how constitutions and laws work.

The media were very careful in what they reported.  They purposely hid some facts from the public that would have been upset the political balance because the candidate Obama was a Democrat.  Had the candidate Obama been a Republican, the Democrats and the media would have moved to disqualify him and they would have started with his peculiar birth. 

As a Democrat, no immigration attorney was ever called to the networks to tell the rest of the story of the birth of Barack Obama.  However, had he been a Republican, the networks would have immigration attorneys lined up around Times Square just to make the most salient of points: If the U.S. Constitution confers American citizenship to a child born of an American mother, doesn’t being born to a foreign father also make him a citizen of his father’s country?  The answer is yes.  That is a condition called Dual Nationality.  A dual national is not a “natural born citizen” under Article II of the U.S. Constitution.  A Republican Barack Obama would have been ruthlessly disqualified on national television. 

There’s another character in this story who intersects the Cartesian coordinates of Presidents Trump and Obama: Senator John McCain.  Senator McCain won the Republican nomination, Senator Obama won the Democratic nomination for President.  If anyone was paying attention, the 2008 race for the Presidency was marred by questions regarding the qualifications of the two nominees.  The Democrats and the media insisted that Barack Obama was a natural born citizen by virtue of being born to an American mother on American soil.  Jus soli (Latin: right of the soil), commonly referred to as birthright citizenship, is the right of anyone born in the territory of a state.  

The House of Representatives passed a resolution essentially declaring John McCain, a person born abroad of American parents, was, as stipulated by Article II of the U.S. Constitution, a natural born citizen.  Jus sanguinis (Latin: right of blood) is a principle of nationality law by which citizenship is not determined by place of birth but by having one or both parents who are citizens of the state.  

In her 1988 article in the Yale Law Journal, Jill Pryor wrote, “It is well settled that ‘native-born’ citizens, those born in the United States, qualify as natural born.  It is also clear that persons born abroad of alien parents, who later become citizens by naturalization, do not.  But whether a person born abroad of American parents, or of one American and one alien parent, qualifies as natural born has never been resolved.”

In the 2008 presidential election, Senator McCain—a person born abroad of American parents—and Senator Obama—a person born of one American parent and one alien parent—had unresolved constitutional eligibility issues.  The issue could only be adjudicated at the U.S. Supreme Court.  If one of the candidates “with standing” had sued the other candidate to resolve the issue of what does it mean by natural born citizen as articulated in the U.S. Constitution, it would have been interesting politics. 

The money would have been on McCain to win any lawsuit outright.  Courts have devised the “but for” rule.  With McCain, “but for” the fact his parents were stationed overseas on official duties he would have been born in the United States and consequently, a natural born citizen and eligible to become president of the United States. 

The Founders specifically wanted to avoid any issue of “split allegiance,” that is a person born of one American parent and one foreign parent, someone who may not have some allegiance to America but may have had a greater allegiance to another country. 

Donald Trump created a firestorm with, “He was a war hero because he was captured.  I like people who weren’t captured.”  Also, “I supported McCain for president.  He lost and let us down....  I've never liked him as much after that.”  No one has ever received an adequate explanation why the pre-president Donald Trump had issues with John McCain. 

I submit Donald Trump cannot and will not forgive John McCain for not taking the obvious constitutionally ineligible Barack Obama to court.  That he was a coward, that he was afraid of being called a racist.  Barack Obama forced John McCain’s hand—either sue me to disqualify me or let it ride and let the voters decide.  When it was time to show leadership in the face of a candidate who played the blood sport of politics, by not taking Barack Obama to court, John McCain simply capitulated and violated his oath of defending the U.S. Constitution. 

Donald Trump will likely never forgive John McCain when the country needed him the most.  John McCain continues to thrust his finger in the air to President Trump.  Donald Trump will likely never forgive Barack Obama for wrecking America.  MAGA, and all that. 

The Left clearly cannot forgive Donald Trump for questioning President Obama’s legitimacy.  Dozens of articles were published in American Thinker regarding the veracity of President Obama’s birth certificate.  The consensus was that BHO’s birth certificate was a forgery.  Counterfeit.

As time went on, candidate Trump got a little smarter on the whole “birther” thing, threatening to sue Senators Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio on their eligibility to be President.  Both men had a parent of another country at the time of their birth.  Candidate Trump isn’t afraid of taking anyone to court.

The manufactured “Russian dossier” on Donald Trump is simply a little “payback” for questioning President Obama’s legitimacy.  The Left will never give up, they will crawl over broken glass and will not rest until they unseat President Trump. 

It’s time to have the Congress pass a law that defines the “natural born citizen” clause in the U.S. Constitution as a person born in America of American parents.  Also, a person born abroad of American parents (but for…) qualifies as natural born.  We could call it the John McCain Rule.

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