Dean John Eastman recently penned a Newsweek article where he questions Kamala Harris's eligibility to serve as vice president. The good dean compares's the Constitution's Article II requirement of having to be a "natural born" citizen with the 14th Amendment's "persons born in the United States" language. Sadly, the 14th Amendment's "born in the United States" language has not been used to interpret Article II's Natural Born requirement. Further, Article II's requirement, which is not defined elsewhere in the Constitution, is widely understood to mean a person merely needs to be born in the United States in order to become eligible for the presidency and vice-presidency. Senator Harris was born in Oakland, i.e., the now trendy suburb of San Francisco. :)
Further, Dean Eastman also misconstrues the 14th Amendment's "person born in the United States" language. As we have debated previously, he suggests the "subject to" language of the 14th Amendment makes children of undocumented person ineligible to become citizens. According to Dean Eastman, and by extension, such children would be ineligible for citizenship, and thus, the presidency or vice-presidency.
Finally, Eastman misreads the legislative history and intent of the 14th Amendment. As I have argued previously, the "subject to" language of the 14th Amendment does not make children of the undocumented ineligible to become citizens. The language he cites simply refers to another matter--the eligibility of children of diplomats and indigenous people (a racist and arcane view of the time of the passage of the Amendment).
Dean Eastman, After our first debate, I offered an open invitation to debate the mater once again? Shall we find a law review for round two? As I hope Dean Eastman would agree, this is a debate more involved than one or more a blog posts. I say we find a locale to fully examine the matter.
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