Born abroad

[Silent Hunter]

Luis Gonzalez, welcome to the forum.

It would probably best to clarify this in law. However, a generic "one US citizen parent makes you eligible for citizen" would arguably result in cases of illegal immigrants getting pregnant by US citizens to avoid deportation.

[Silent Hunter]

My understanding of the law at the time:
A natural born citizen must be either:
- Born in the US, or
- Born with both parents as citizens, or
- Born to a US citizen who has been a citizen for at least 10 years, with at least 5 of those years being after the age of 14.

Since Obama's mother was 18 when he was born, she could not have been a citizen for 5 years after her 14th birthday and before Barack Obama's birth, and so he would not have been a natural born citizen if born outside the US.

...or something like that.

That makes sense. Which is why the "birthers" want to see Obama's US birth certificate.

[Silent Hunter]

Britain permits dual citizenship though.

Since Obama was born in the USA, he is therefore a US citizen and always has been.

[Silent Hunter]

There is a difference in UK law between being a "subject" and a "citizen".

All we have in this issue are opinions. This has never been legally tested.

[Silent Hunter]

"(1) a person born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof;"

Wasn't Obama born in the United States? Hawaii became a state in 1959.

1 and 7 appear to be separate criteria- you just need one.

[Silent Hunter]

As Obama was born in the US, wasn't he subject to the jurisdiction thereof?

Section 301:

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The way that's structured implies that any of those criteria are sufficient. Obama meets three of them.

[Silent Hunter]

You cannot be both a natural born citizen, and a British subject at birth.

Of course you can. British subjects are not British citizens. The terms are not the same.

[Silent Hunter]

Avoiding foreign influence, OK. Considering Obama hardly knew his father, he didn't exactly have much "foreign influence".

[Silent Hunter]

Avoiding foreign influence, OK. Considering Obama hardly knew his father, he didn't exactly have much "foreign influence".

So then, what do we know.

He was born a British subject, and then attended a Catholic School in Indonesia for several years, where he was registered as an Indonesian citizen named "Barry Soetoro" and his religion listed as "Muslim" (according to the school's records) by his mother's husband Lolo Soetoro, who may have adopted Barack Obama. The he transferred to a Madrassa, where he was a student until he age of ten.

There is speculation about "Barry's" possible Indonesian citizenship, since adoption by Lolo Soetoro prior to "Barry's" fifth birthday would have automatically made him an Indonesian citizen. That citizenship would explain his being allowed to enroll in an Indonesian public school.

Barack Obama's admission to having traveled to Pakistan while the nation was under military rule adds fuel to the citizenship question, since it was quite difficult to travel there with a US passport at that time, but far easier for someone holding Indonesian citizenship, and an Indonesian passport.

These questions could be easily settled, if not for the fact that his adoption records, along with his kindergarten records, Punahou school records, Occidental College records, Columbia University records, Columbia thesis, Harvard Law School records, Harvard Law Review articles, scholarly articles from the University of Chicago, his passport, medical records, files from his years as an Illinois state senator, and Illinois State Bar Association records, are all sealed.

Doesn't that set off an alarm in your head?

What does his Columbia thesis have to do with anything? Or his school records?

Yep, this is starting to set off an alarm in my head.

"Shut the gates! Troll coming!".

[Silent Hunter]

I don't quite understand why you're so obsessed with this.

Because some people can't accept when they've lost.

[Silent Hunter]

You cannot be both a natural born citizen, and a British subject at birth.

Of course you can. British subjects are not British citizens. The terms are not the same.

You're British, or do you just live there?

The former. I don't think the 1948 Act is the one you should be referring to. There have been several later acts.