‘One Last Grasp’: Conservative Group’s Birther Attack on Kamala Harris Citing SCOTUS Ruling on Citizenship of Descendants of Enslaved People Is ‘Misguided’ and ‘Extreme,’ Dems Say

A conservative Republican political group contends that Vice President Kamala Harris is not a natural-born citizen and is not eligible to run for president and cites the notorious 1857 Supreme Court decision in the Dred Scott case, which said enslaved people were not citizens, in support of its claim. The platform and policy document of the National Federation of Republican Assemblies (NFRA), a 90-year-old conservative political organization that once counted former president Ronald Reagan as a member, argues that the U.S. Constitution states that “No person except a natural born Citizen, shall be eligible, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President.” The document further states that “an originalist and strict constructionist understanding of the Constitution in the tradition of [conservative Supreme Court jurists Antonin] Scalia and [Clarence] Thomas, and “precedent-setting U.S. Supreme Court cases … have found that a ‘Natural Born Citizen’ is defined as a person born on American soil of parents who are both citizens of the United States at the time of the child’s birth.” Vice President Kamala Harris and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz met with college students in Savannah on...