Harvard professor says Ted Cruz’s own philosophy renders him ineligible for the presidency
Texas Sen. Ted Cruz has been busy combatting claims that his Canadian birth makes him ineligible for the presidency, but one Harvard professor is arguing that Cruz’s own logic could be his next opponent in the debate.
Laurence Tribe, a constitutional law professor who once taught Cruz as his student, called the senator a “fair weather originalist’’ in a Boston Globe op-ed, noting that Cruz has trumpeted his views of a strict interpretation of the Constitution on the campaign trail — except when it comes to the question of his citizenship and potential to run for president.
“To his kind of judge, Cruz ironically wouldn’t be eligible, because the legal principles that prevailed in the 1780s and ’90s required that someone actually be born on US soil to be a ‘natural born’ citizen,’’ Tribe argued.
While Cruz is a naturalized citizen, he was born in Canada to an American mother rather than on U.S. soil, leading some — including fellow contender Donald Trump — to challenge his eligibility.
When questioned, Cruz has tried to shut down the challenge, telling CNN that, “The Constitution and laws of the U.S. are very straight-forward,’’ and that children of U.S. citizens who are born abroad are natural-born citizens themselves.
Tribe, who said in the op-ed that he disagreed with Cruz’s views while teaching him at Harvard but “enjoyed jousting with him,’’ told Boston.com that he hesitated before taking his opinion to the Globe, waiting longer than he would have to write about a stranger.
“I usually do all I can ethically do to help my former students, including those whose views about how the Constitution should be interpreted and who should have the last word on constitutional questions I find it personally tough to swallow,’’ he said in an email, also noting that he’s supported past students who had views that conflicted with his own.
Were Cruz to win the election, Tribe argues that he may be at odd with the very justices he would like to appoint to the Supreme Court. They could deny Cruz’s citizenship interpretation, and say he lacks the authority to carry out the executive power that accompanies the presidency.
“There are lots of reasons to be skeptical about the rigid approach to the Constitution espoused by Cruz and many of his fellow Republican candidates,’’ Tribe wrote in the op-ed. “The rich irony — that it could hypothetically render him powerless to keep one of his most inhumane promises if applied consistently — is just the latest example of why constitutional interpretation matters.’’
Cruz’s argument, Tribe says, contradicts the senator’s take on other issues, such as the 2nd Amendment, which he says was clearly spelled out by the Founding Fathers and shouldn’t be challenged. In a CNN interview, Tribe accused Cruz of playing “fast and loose with the Constitution,’’ as the document doesn’t explicitly say whether or not naturalized citizens can run for president alongside those born on U.S. soil, and the definition of who exactly qualifies as a “natural born citizen’’ is far from settled.
“It was primarily that opportunistic way of analyzing the Constitution in his own favor, combined with his quite shocking view that Congress should be empowered to reverse Supreme Court rulings with which it disagrees and his implicit — and even scarier — position that a president should not feel bound by the Supreme Court’s constitutional rulings anyway, that persuaded me I should write the op-ed,’’ Tribe said in the email.
The idea of Cruz taking advice from Donald Trump and putting the question before a court is “far-fetched legally,’’ Tribe said, as “the last thing he would want to do is admit that the question is at all uncertain rather than, as he insists, ‘settled.’’’
Cruz’s campaign did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Read Tribe’s full Globe op-ed here.
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