Does McCain Meet Citizenship Requirement?

We have noted before that GOP presidential candidate John McCain was born in the Panama Canal Zone raising the question of whether he is a natural born citizen as required for U.S. presidents. A case has been filed challenging McCain’s eligibility. Chris Rizo writes in LegalNewsLine.com:

A federal judge has ordered expedited briefing in a case that contends that John McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, cannot become president because he was not born on U.S. soil.

The American Independent Party is seeking to have the Arizona senator’s name removed from ballots in California.

The group says in court papers that federal law would bar the former Vietnam War POW from taking office were he to be elected in November because he was born in the Panama Canal Zone in 1936 while his father was stationed at Coco Solo Naval Air Station.

U.S. District Court Judge William Alsup of the Northern District of California will hear arguments in the case Sept. 11, said AIP attorney Gregory Walston of the law firm of Walston Cross of San Francisco.

The American Independent Party claims it will be “irreparably harmed by Senator McCain’s illegal and illegitimate presence on the ballot.”

The plaintiffs in the case want McCain enjoined from running for president.

In 1937, Congress enacted a law granting citizenship to people born in the Panama Canal Zone after 1904. But critics say the law still does not confer “natural-born” citizenship on McCain, which would be required for him to take the Oval Office. Click here for the rest of the story.

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