Sen. Ted Cruz releases birth certificate

Catalina Camia | USA TODAY

Texas Sen. Ted Cruz released his birth certificate to The Dallas Morning News -- a pre-emptive strike that could help head off criticism that the Republican is ineligible to run for president.

Cruz, a darling of the Tea Party movement, has been visiting early presidential states such as Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina, which has sparked speculation that he's interested in a White House bid.

The Constitution says only a "natural born" citizen can be president. The general rule is that anyone born overseas to an American parent is eligible to run.

Cruz's birth certificate shows he was born in Calgary, Canada, in 1970 to an American-born mother and, as such, is a U.S. citizen. But The Dallas Morning News reports Cruz also became a citizen of Canada "the moment he was born" and would need to renounce Canadian citizenship, according to Canadian authorities and legal experts.

Cruz's spokeswoman, Catherine Frazier, disagrees that the senator has dual citizenship.

"Senator Cruz became a U.S. citizen at birth, and he never had to go through a naturalization process after birth to become a U.S. citizen," Frazier told the Dallas newspaper. "To our knowledge, he never had Canadian citizenship, so there is nothing to renounce."

The political interest in Cruz's birth certificate brings to mind the saga of President Obama's birth certificate. Obama was born in Hawaii in 1961, but there has been lingering doubt since his first presidential race that he is not a U.S. citizen. Obama released his birth certificate in 2011, but some critics — dubbed "birthers" — still believe he is not eligible to be president.

These sorts of questions didn't start with Obama. Arizona Sen. John McCain, born in the Panama Canal Zone, went through this in the 2008 campaign. In the 1960s, Barry Goldwater, born in Phoenix three years before Arizona became a state, and George Romney, who was born in Mexico, faced questions during their White House campaigns.

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