Kansas officials plan to hold a hearing Thursday afternoon to weigh whether President Barack Obama is a citizen and should appear on the state's November ballot.
The Kansas Objections Board will be considering a challenge filed by Joe Montgomery, a Manhattan resident, who Monday objected to Obama being on the ballot. He claims the president is not an American citizen since his father was a citizen of the United Kingdom and Kenya. The all-Republican board -- which consists of Secretary of State Kris Kobach, Lt. Gov. Jeff Colyer and Attorney General Derek Schmidt -- has the power to remove Obama from the ballot in his mother's home state.
Montgomery, the communications coordinator for the College of Veterinary Medicine at Kansas State University, said in his filing that he does not believe Obama meets the criteria for citizenship because of his father's citizenship. He cites several Supreme Court rulings in the filing, which he says validate his argument. In the filing, Montgomery said that the rulings show a "natural born citizen" is a person born of two American citizens.
Montgomery wrote:
Barack Obama, according to multiple sources, was not born to a citizen father. His father was never even admitted to this country as a resident alien. Barack Obama Sr. retained his British and Kenyan citizenship and passed them onto his son, which Mr. Obama has publicly claimed on his Fight the Smears website. The Supreme Court specified that natural-born citizenship inherently excludes dual citizenship through a citation in U.S. v. Wong Kim Ark (which was citing U.S. v Rhodes, noting that one could only be a British subject or a natural-born citizen, and not hold both citizenships):
All persons born in the allegiance of the King are natural-born subjects, and all persons born in the allegiance of the United States are natural-born citizens.
Montgomery also claimed that Obama has failed to justify his citizenship and said that the birth certificate provided by the White House is "doctored." Hawaii officials, including former Gov. Linda Lingle (R), have said Obama was born in Honolulu and his birth certificate is real.
"Despite several lawsuits challenging Mr. Obama's constitutional eligibility and place of birth, Mr. Obama has failed to provide any valid, certified documentary evidence to legally establish birth in this country, much less to citizen parents. Further there is substantial evidence showing that much of Mr. Obama's alleged birth certificates have been forged or doctored, and have not been confirmed as legally valid, true and accurate," Montgomery wrote. "In terms of the legal precedent expressed by the U.S. Supreme Court, this doesn't matter, we have a longstanding legal precedent through the U.S. Supreme Court, which is our nation's highest judicial authority. Under the court's definition, Barack Obama is not Constitutionally eligible for the office of president."
Montgomery reached by phone at his Kansas State office, confirmed that he did file the objection, but said he did not have time "to talk to the press." The email filing to Kobach's office was sent from Montgomery's personal email address.
The Kansas Objections Board previously tossed out an objection to Obama that was filed in April, saying that the board could not consider the objection on technical grounds, since Obama had not been submitted as a candidate for the general election. Obama became a general election candidate during last week's Democratic National Convention. Other states via courts or elections boards have dismissed objections to Obama's citizenship and ballot placement.
Kobach, a Tea Party favorite who wrote Arizona's controversial immigration law, said in 2010 that Obama should release his birth certificate and in 2009 joked at a state GOP event that neither Obama nor God have birth certificates.
State Democratic Party officials dismissed Montgomery's objection and said they would not be attending today's hearing in Topeka. "This is a fictitious and baseless suit," state Democratic Party spokesman Dakota Loomis said. "It should be cleaned up by the end of the day."
Obama's mother, Ann Dunham, and maternal grandparents, Stanley and Madelyn Dunham, are Kansas natives.
UPDATE: 5:52 p.m. -- The all-Republican Objections Board voted unanimously on Thursday afternoon to delay a final decision on Obama's eligibility for the state's ballot until a meeting Monday, pending either documentation on the president's citizenship from Hawaii officials or the presence of the Obama campaign.
According to tweets from the meeting, Kobach proposed that the board meet again Monday to discuss Obama's citizenship and look into receiving more documentation. Board members expressed concern that Obama's campaign did not attend the hearing, instead submitting a letter defending the president and saying he is eligible for the ballot in Kansas. State Democratic Party spokesman Dakota Loomis told HuffPost earlier Thursday that Democrats would not be attending the hearing, which he dismissed as "fictitious and baseless."
Joe Montgomery, the Kansas State University employee who brought the objection, attended the hearing. Tweets from meeting attendees indicated that the entire board had concerns about Obama's campaign not attending.
In May, Arizona Secretary of State Ken Bennett (R) suggested that he would not allow Obama onto his state's ballot unless Hawaii provided a certified copy of the president's birth certificate. Hawaiian officials provided a list of steps on how they would release the documents, requiring Arizona to prove need. Bennett later backed down on the suggestion.
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