Lawsuit claims Obama not eligible for president

By Luke Broadwater
Examiner Staff Writer 8/26/08

Citing information from Wikipedia and “Inside Edition,” a Pennsylvania attorney filed a federal lawsuit against Democratic Party presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama, claiming he is not a U.S. citizen.

The lawsuit, filed Aug. 21 in the U.S. District Court for eastern Pennsylvania, alleges Obama was born in Kenya, not Hawaii.

Only citizens born in the United States are eligible to become president, according to the U.S. Constitution.

“Stanley Ann Dunham gave birth to Obama in Kenya, after which she flew to Hawaii and registered Obama’s birth,” wrote attorney Philip Berg, of Lafayette Hill, Pa., who runs a Web site called “Obamacrimes.com.”

The Obama campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the lawsuit, but the Illinois senator’s Web site features his Hawaii birth certificate under the heading “Fight The Smears: The Truth about Barack’s birth certificate.”

The campaign site calls a “lie” claims that Obama is not a natural born citizen.

“Senator Obama was born in Hawaii in 1961, after it became a state on August 21st, 1959,” his campaign site states.

“Obama became a citizen at birth under the first section of the 14th Amendment.”

In his lawsuit, Berg writes that the document on Obama’s site is a “forgery.”

He cites discrepancies between Wikipedia’s English and Italian editions, which report Obama as being born in two different Hawaiian hospitals. Wikipedia allows any user to post or alter its information.

In the lawsuit, Berg also writes that Obama lost his citizenship when his mother moved the family to Indonesia and cites an “Inside Edition” report of a school registration form there.

But the University of Pennsylvania’s Annenberg Political Fact Check reviewed the birth certificate posted on Obama’s site and concluded “that it meets all of the requirements from the State Department for proving U.S. citizenship.”

The political fact-checking organization also said a researcher also has found a birth announcement for Obama published in the Honolulu Advertiser on Aug. 13, 1961.

“We suggest that those who [believe a conspiracy involving a planted birth announcement] should first equip themselves with a high-quality tinfoil hat,” Factcheck.org states. “The evidence is clear: Barack Obama was born in the U.S.A.”

lbroadwater@baltimoreexaminer.com

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