Democrats will likely push the envelope on Ted Cruz's citizenship issue should he become the Republican nominee, rival candidate Rand Paul warned on Monday.
"The Democrats have already threatened," the Kentucky senator told Fox News' Martha MacCallum on the
"America's Newsroom" program. "I think without question everyone would accept that, you know, Cruz is a natural-born Canadian."
Cruz's mother was an American citizen and his father had come from Cuba. The Texas senator was born in Canada and held dual citizenship papers from both the United States and Canada until about 18 months ago.
And since Cruz was born over the border, "I think without question everybody would accept that you know, Cruz is a natural-born Canadian," Paul said. "He was naturally born there. The question is, can you be natural-born Canadian and natural-born American at the same time? Maybe, but the courts will have to decide. It has never been decided."
Through the years, legal authorities have considered a person to be a citizen if at least one parent is a U.S. citizen, but Paul argued, that in the Constitution, it required that a president be "natural born."
"It appears to be a unique qualification and most people have interpreted they had to be born in the U.S.," Paul said. "If your parents had you outside of the country and you were born in France or Canada you were always considered to be a citizen but [it is a unique thing to be natural born. I think Democrats will force it to be adjudicated and I think eventually the Supreme Court will probably have to decide it."
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.