Texas Sen. [crscore]Ted Cruz[/crscore] is a “natural born citizen,” according to the Illinois Board of Elections.
The state’s BOE ruled that Cruz met the citizenship criteria to appear on the state’s primary ballot.
Two state residents, William Graham and Lawrence Joyce, challenged Cruz’s eligibility with the board, claiming his name should not appear on the March 15 primary ballot because his candidacy did not comply with Article II of the U.S. Constitution.
“No Person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President,” the Constitution reads. “Either shall any Person be eligible to that Office who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty five Years, and been Fourteen Years a Resident within the United States.”
The board rejected the objections, The Huffington Post first reported. According to HuffPo, Joyce does not plan to appeal the decision due to lack of resources but hopes someone else will.
“The Candidate is a natural born citizen by virtue of being born in Canada to his mother who was a U.S. citizen at the time of his birth,” the board stated, saying that Cruz “did not have to take any steps or go through a naturalization process at some point after birth,” adding, “Further discussion on this issue is unnecessary.”
Graham also filed a separate challenge to Florida Sen. [crscore]Marco Rubio[/crscore]’s eligibility for the presidency.
New York billionaire and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump whacked Cruz repeatedly over whether the Texas senator qualified to be on the presidential ballot for the last month and urged Cruz to go to the courts to be declared a natural born citizen.
“It’s not anything that’s going to happen, and I’m not going to be taking legal advice anytime soon from Donald Trump,” Cruz said in response to Trump’s accusations at the January 14 Republican debate.
