Can someone born in Puerto Rico become the President of the United States? It’s never been tried.
Puerto Rico is tightly integrated into the United States. It became a U.S. territory in 1898, and Puerto Ricans gained U.S. citizenship through a law Congress passed in 1917. There are now twice as many Puerto Ricans living stateside than in Puerto Rico, roughly 6 million to 3 million.
Yet people who live in Puerto Rico cannot vote for U.S. President. Puerto Ricans can fight in the U.S. armed forces, and many do so, but when they return home, they cannot vote for their Commander in Chief.
Although Puerto Rican residents cannot vote for President, people born in Puerto Rico can become President, with one ironic twist: they wouldn’t be able to vote for themselves unless they lived in a state. We explain below.
What the Law Says
The U.S. Constitution contains three eligibility requirements to be President under the United States: (1) attaining 35 years of age, (2) establishing residency “within the United States” for 14 years, and (3) being a “natural born Citizen.”
The term “natural born Citizen” is not defined in the U.S. Constitution, but the Fourteenth amendment states that “all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”
In 2016, the Congressional Research Service (CRS) analyzed the term “natural born” citizenship as a qualification for President. Bringing in the famous Puerto Rican based Insular Cases, CRS cited a 1994 U.S. Court of Appeals case that concluded birth in an unincorporated territory or possession of the United States “did not grant Fourteenth Amendment or common law citizenship as being born ‘in’ the geographic area of the ‘United States.'”
Further quoting the 1994 court case, CRS explained that, “the Citizenship Clause has an express territorial limitation which prevents its extension to every place over which the government exercises its sovereignty,” and that “those born in U.S. unincorporated territories or possessions should not necessarily be considered as being born ‘in’ the United States” under the Constitution.
Congress may work around this hurdle by passing a law and providing statutory U.S. citizenship, as in the case of Puerto Rico.
The Precedent
In 1964, the late Sen. Barry Goldwater (R-AZ) accepted the nomination of the Republican Party to run against incumbent President Lyndon Johnson. Goldwater was born near Phoenix in 1909, three years before the Arizona territory was admitted as a U.S. state. He lost the election, and the nature of Goldwater’s citizenship was never raised.
The issue then remained dormant until 2000, when interest piqued as Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) ran for U.S. president. McCain had been born in the Panama Canal Zone on August 29, 1936 on a U.S. military base to parents who were American citizens. McCain’s campaign faltered and he withdrew his candidacy on March 9, 2000, before the issue was resolved.
In 2003, the New York Times published an editorial in favor of efforts by Senator Orrin Hatch (R-UT) and Congressman Vic Snyder (D-AR) to rid the Constitution of the requirement that only “natural born” citizens be eligible to be President of the United States.
The editorial pointed out that since the writing of the Constitution, the U.S. has become a nation of immigrants, with some living in residence for decades. These individuals, by their loyalty and contributions to the nation, deserved to be considered eligible to become President, including some 700 immigrants whose valor in combat warranted the bestowal of the nation’s highest citation, the Congressional Medal of Honor. The New York times endorsed congressional proposals by Senator Hatch to make anyone who has been a citizen for 20 years and a resident for 14 years eligible for the presidency, and Mr. Snyder’s plan to require a 35-year waiting period for eligibility.
When Senator McCain ran for President again in 2008, the world was at least a little better prepared. In April, Senator Claire McCaskill, a Democrat from Missouri, took the lead in passing a Senate resolution labeling her Republican colleague a “natural born Citizen” under the U.S. Constitution.
Roughly six months later, a federal judge ruled that “[i]n 1937, to remove any doubt as to persons in Senator McCain’s circumstances in the Canal Zone, Congress enacted 8 U.S.C. 1403(a), which declared that persons in Senator McCain’s circumstances are citizens by virtue of their birth, thereby retroactively rendering Senator McCain a natural born citizen, if he was not one already.”
McCain became the Republican nominee for U.S. President in 2008 but lost to Barack Obama.
Just as a provision in U.S. law qualified John McCain as a U.S. citizen despite being born in Panama in 1936, Federal law declares that all persons born in Puerto Rico are U.S. citizens (8 U.S.C. 1402).
This U.S. law may not have all of the force and protections of the U.S. Constitution, but the law appears to qualify a statutory U.S. citizen as a “natural born Citizen” and therefore eligible to run for President. Perhaps it’s time to find a candidate.
Ths article was posted in 2011. When was it written?
It claims, “No one seems clear on this issue. The Congressional offices of Hawaii and Alaska, both former U.S. territories turned states, have no definitive answer and, as yet, no one from those new states has made a run for the Presidency. ”
Um… Barack Obama ran and won in 2008. Sarah Palin ran as VP in 2008.
Thank you for your thoughtful comment. We have updated the article.