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| Obama Sued In Federal Court On Grounds He Is Ineligible To Be President |
| 2008-08-21 |
| A prominent Philadelphia attorney and Hillary Clinton supporter filed suit this afternoon in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania against Illinois Sen. Barack Obama and the Democratic National Committee. The action seeks an injunction preventing the senator from continuing his candidacy and a court order enjoining the DNC from nominating him next week, all on grounds that Sen. Obama is constitutionally ineligible to run for and hold the office of President of the United States. Phillip Berg, the filing attorney, is a former gubernatorial and senatorial candidate, former chair of the Democratic Party in Montgomery (PA) County, former member of the Democratic State Committee, and former Deputy Attorney General of Pennsylvania. According to Berg, he filed the suit--just days before the DNC is to hold its nominating convention in Denver--for the health of the Democratic Party. "I filed this action at this time," Berg stated, "to avoid the obvious problems that will occur when the Republican Party raises these issues after Obama is nominated.". Berg cited a number of unanswered questions regarding the Illinois senator's background, and in today's lawsuit maintained that Sen. Obama is not a naturalized U.S. citizen or that, if he ever was, he lost his citizenship when he was adopted in Indonesia. Berg also cites what he calls "dual loyalties" due to his citizenship and ties with Kenya and Indonesia. Even if Sen. Obama can prove his U.S. citizenship, Berg stated, citing the senator's use of a birth certificate from the state of Hawaii verified as a forgery by three independent document forensic experts, the issue of "multi-citizenship with responsibilities owed to and allegiance to other countries" remains on the table. In the lawsuit, Berg states that Sen. Obama was born in Kenya, and not in Hawaii as the senator maintains. Before giving birth, according to the lawsuit, Obama's mother traveled to Kenya with his father but was prevented from flying back to Hawaii because of the late stage of her pregnancy, "apparently a normal restriction to avoid births during a flight." As Sen. Obama's own paternal grandmother, half-brother and half-sister have also claimed, Berg maintains that Stanley Ann Dunham--Obama's mother--gave birth to little Barack in Kenya and subsequently flew to Hawaii to register the birth. Berg cites inconsistent accounts of Sen. Obama's birth, including reports that he was born at two separate hospitals--Kapiolani Hospital and Queens Hospital--in Honolulu, as well a profound lack of birthing records for Stanley Ann Dunham, though simple "registry of birth" records for Barack Obama are available in a Hawaiian public records office. Should Sen. Obama truly have been born in Kenya, Berg writes, the laws on the books at the time of his birth hold that U.S. citizenship may only pass to a child born overseas to a U.S. citizen parent and non-citizen parent if the former was at least 19 years of age. Sen. Obama's mother was only 18 at the time. Therefore, because U.S. citizenship could not legally be passed on to him, Obama could not be registered as a "natural born" citizen and would therefore be ineligible to seek the presidency pursuant to Article II, Section 1 of the United States Constitution. Moreover, even if Sen. Obama could have somehow been deemed "natural born," that citizenship was lost in or around 1967 when he and his mother took up residency in Indonesia, where Stanley Ann Dunham married Lolo Soetoro, an Indonesian citizen. Berg also states that he possesses copies of Sen. Obama's registration to Fransiskus Assisi School In Jakarta, Indonesia which clearly show that he was registered under the name "Barry Soetoro" and his citizenship listed as Indonesian. The Hawaiian birth certificate, Berg says, is a forgery. In the suit, the attorney states that the birth certificate on record is a forgery, has been identified as such by three independent document forensic experts, and actually belonged to Maya Kasandra Soetoro, Sen. Obama's half-sister. "Voters donated money, goods and services to elect a nominee and were defrauded by Sen. Obama's lies and obfuscations," Berg stated. "If the DNC officers ... had performed one ounce of due diligence we would not find ourselves in this emergency predicament, one week away from making a person the nominee who has lost their citizenship as a child and failed to even perform the basic steps of regaining citizenship as prescribed by constitutional laws." "It is unfair to the country," he continued, "for candidates of either party to become the nominee when there is any question of the ability to serve if elected." Eds, you may want to hold this one over for tomorrow. |
| Posted by:Anonymoose |
| #8 This is crap. Barack Obama was born in the USA and is a natural born American citizen. See this report in FactCheck.org. |
| Posted by: Steve White 2008-08-21 23:17 |
| #7 All this penny ante legal sniping distracts us from The Real Question: Is Obama the anti-Christ? |
| Posted by: SteveS 2008-08-21 22:43 |
| #6 Note the timing. This came just days after Hillary's name was allowed on the floor vote. And to all those who said this would never be an issue -- told you so. |
| Posted by: Iblis 2008-08-21 22:24 |
| #5 It is time to unite - hand in hand and shoulder to shoulder." Goodness, that old thing? Good catch, Besoeker! |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2008-08-21 22:13 |
| #4 Coming from ANYONE but Phillip Berg, well maybe. A message from Phil Berg: A call to unity - 911 for the truth! "It is time for a non-violent revolution by the millions of Americans who are tired of their rights being diminished by the Bush Administration; tired of the lies of the Bush Administration; tired of the lies about Iraq; and tired and disgusted with the lies about 911. NOW is the time to stand tall together and bring back our freedoms as they stood under the Declaration of Independence, Bill of Rights and the Constitution of the United States. It is time to unite - hand in hand and shoulder to shoulder." |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2008-08-21 21:38 |
| #3 I guess the biggest unanswered question at this point is: did Hillary get the VP slot? If the answer is no - then this is going to be one bloody, brass knuckle, cage match that will make Michale Vick's dogfights look like puppy play. haha |
| Posted by: Betty Grating2215 2008-08-21 21:33 |
| #2 This is either the death blow by Hillary, or it is a move to take if off the table before the general election. It could backfire either way. If it is Hillary behind it and Obama is taken out this way, the dhimocrats that supported him and a lot of middle road supporters (support the D in a election) are going to be jaded and pissed off and may not even come out on election day. If it is a move to remove the issue for the R party, then it could be smothered with legal paperwork, put in limbo then dismissed after the election. Interesting times. |
| Posted by: DarthVader 2008-08-21 21:28 |
| #1 Tread carefully on this one. There is fire behind this smoke, but I suspect what they are hoping for is to get the media to pounce on an aspect of the story that is untrue, and then trumpet that all of it is untrue. It may also be that what they are doing is attempting to break this before the nomination. They desperately wanted the Republicans to do it, but they didn't bite so now the Dem's had to do it themselves. It may be that they want to have it come out before the convention so they can say it is "old news" after the convention. Or it could be Hillary sticking in the knife. The stuff they are coming up with is very damaging stuff and it will be hard for people to just "move on" when they hear the whole story. |
| Posted by: Betty Grating2215 2008-08-21 21:18 |