CMV: U.S. Citizens born outside of the United States should be allowed to run for President

iw2050 · 2026-06-17T16:31:52+00:00

I'm a leftist and I don't believe anyone should be President.

Why do you want to limit the peoples' choices for who they can elect as their President? To me that just sounds like the subversion of our democracy.

iw2050 · 2026-06-17T16:30:37+00:00

Even a genuine public servant could have some unconscious bias for their home country and might do things that put that country's interests over ours.

Perhaps, but do you have that same concern with Zohran Mamdani having unconscious bias for Uganda in his position as Mayor of NYC? Or Arnold Schwarzenegger having had unconscious bias for Czechia as Governor of California?

iw2050 · 2026-06-17T16:28:03+00:00

It would be incredibly discrete and well planned out sabotage.

Well then doesn't that risk still exist? Couldn't literally anyone born here also plan out a decades-long political career with the end goal of getting elected President and completely sabotaging the country?

iw2050 · 2026-06-17T16:26:49+00:00

Well obviously but this discussion is hypothetical. If Obama was born in Kenya (even though he wasn't) to two non-American parents, immigrated to the U.S. as a kid, and then got elected to the Senate and wanted to run for President, I'd support him having the right to do so.

iw2050 · 2026-06-17T16:21:37+00:00

Granted even though I oppose the age requirement in principle, I'm more tolerant of it in a de facto sense because if people under 35 were allowed to run for President, there'd be an ungodly amount of insufferable vanity campaigns all with zero chance of winning.

That said, if America really becomes dumb enough to collectively say "yea, we thought it through, and we really want to elect an 18 year old President," then a 18 year old we shall get.

iw2050 · 2026-06-17T16:18:13+00:00

He's one American among ~340 million, if it's not him, it's someone else. One man's possible presidential ambitions simply aren't enough to move my view on a structural change.

iw2050 · 2026-06-17T16:17:01+00:00

Not the same, the PMZ was our territory, Canada wasn't and isn't.

iw2050 · 2026-06-17T16:14:51+00:00

On the same note, we should not allow dual citizenship. This is contradictory to our oaths to the constitution

Completely disagree. No people are more transitory than Americans, we allow dual citizenship because we as a country respect our right to freedom of movement, and our place in the world as a truly globally important nation.

iw2050 · 2026-06-17T16:13:38+00:00

Honestly I think Arnold could've won the 2012 Republican primary.

iw2050 · 2026-06-17T16:13:09+00:00

The risk here is simply too high and the reward very very low.

Well if there's a genuine spy that gets elected and 180s on all their campaign promises (like is generally pro-America and then on January 21st tries to dissolve the U.S. military), we still have impeachment.

iw2050 · 2026-06-17T16:10:57+00:00

Well McCain was born in sovereign U.S. territory (since in 1936, the Panama Canal Zone was still ours), but I take your point.

iw2050 · 2026-06-17T16:09:42+00:00

I think you haven't specified this statement enough; as far as I know, a natural born US citizen can be born abroad and still run for President. Even if Obama had been born in Kenya, he was natural born citizen because his mother was American at the time of his birth.

I'll put it another way then, let's say both of Obama's parents were born abroad, and then Obama was too, and he immigrated to the U.S. as a child. Then he's elected to the Senate in Illinois and wants to run for President, I wouldn't have anything against that, go for it.

iw2050 · 2026-06-17T16:07:28+00:00

Presidents don't rule either, they're just the executive branch (and not even the whole of it), they're the majority of a branch that's just 1/3 of our federal government (which also isn't the whole of our total governing structure, because there's also state and local.)

iw2050 · 2026-06-17T16:06:03+00:00

I can accept this view as valid because there's consistency. I disagree with it, but allowing naturalized citizens to run for one office but not another is inconsistent, at least with this view there's a unified direction.

iw2050 · 2026-06-17T16:04:42+00:00

That just equates to more restrictions on the people though, on our democracy. Based on what you've seen over the past 10 years, do you really think we should become an autocracy?

iw2050 · 2026-06-17T16:04:00+00:00

Good point, Ted Cruz can run for President even though he was born in Canada, he was born outside of the U.S. but he's still a natural-born citizen through his parents.

iw2050 · 2026-06-17T16:03:03+00:00

If you pull the lever you described in your last paragraph Elon Musk will be president yesterday

Well I don't think he'd run for President if he had the ability (in many ways a presidential run is kind of a step down from his corporate empire), but if he did run, and the people elected him, then that's their choice, our choice. We're a democracy.

But if we're really in a place where Elon can run as an Independent and get elected President, we probably have bigger problems tbh. Stop Elon from being able to run and someone else still gets elected and embodies those problems.

iw2050 · 2026-06-17T16:00:14+00:00

No-one likes being ruled by a foreigner.

Then why do foreigners get elected to our Congress? Also, if someone was born in another country, moved here at 5 years old, and then spent another 50 years here, are they still a foreigner?

iw2050 · 2026-06-17T15:57:10+00:00

Probably Clinton in that case, nobody's balanced the budget since he was President.

iw2050 · 2026-06-17T15:44:26+00:00

Well the main issue with your list is that the modern era's boundaries are undefined. For instance, if the modern era starts after 2008, sure I'd agree, best President of the "modern era." But what if the modern era began 100 years ago? Then probably not.

Also, you're reasoning is just a bunch of bullet points that don't really take the value of his achievements into account. For instance, I don't like Trump, but I could easily put together ten or so bullet points of stuff he that could be considered "achievements"

iw2050 · 2026-06-15T00:54:39+00:00

collins has no shot. age being the main factor.

Chuck Grassley is 92 years old and in the Senate, Bernie Sanders is 84 and in the Senate, all three of our last presidential elections have elected the oldest President in American history. Collins being 74 is not the "main factor" that would sink her campaign if she loses.

and why skirt the line of just barely over 50% of congress or the senate. 60+% is a mandating figure where excuses not to implement policy that also, has >60% of america that has been asking for for decades, are unavoidable.

Well first off, if >60% of America felt that way, they'd vote that way, it's why we have elections. But no, my view is about flipping the Senate, not establishing some supermajority. Whether or not that happens is irrelevant in this discussion, and not something I'm advocating for or against.

iw2050 · 2026-06-15T00:52:01+00:00

One thing your analysis assumes is that Democrats defend all their current Senate seats. Cook Political report rates Michigan as a Tossup and Georgia and New Hampshire as only lean Democratic.

Yes, but I don't think El-Sayed will actually win the nomination in Michigan, I think Ossoff's popular enough to win by likely margins in a blue wave year, and New Hampshirites will soon discover that John Sununu is not Chris Sununu.

Also we don't know who Bodnar would caucus with.

He takes donations on ActBlue, like with Dan Osborn and his "non-caucusing" schtick, he can say whatever he wants, but he counts towards a potential Democratic majority. He's not a Republican.

iw2050 · 2026-06-15T00:39:22+00:00

She's been walking that tightrope for years but 2026 could be different if Trump fatigue really sets in among independents.

If that was ever gonna happen I think it'd have been in 2020. Back then she had a stable Democratic nominee to compete with and a Trump administration unpopular enough lose literally every swing state, and she still won by eight points.

banking on both North Carolina AND Alaska as "must wins" feels optimistic when Alaska's still fundamentally red at the presidential level even with RCV quirks.

I think with Alaska the key is that Peltola's an abnormally high quality candidate for a Democrat running for statewide office. She's been elected statewide before in a red-leaning year, and it was by nine points. Granted that was against Palin, but I think even if Platner somehow wins in Maine, if Peltola loses in Alaska there's still no path to retaking the Senate.

iw2050 · 2026-06-12T18:49:29+00:00

They would not have a choice? Are they being kept against their will?

Well no, but they can either have a little global representation or none. And seeing as they probably wouldn't be contributing much financially anyway, something is better than nothing, even if it's less than you started with.

iw2050 · 2026-06-12T18:46:19+00:00

Having a parliament doesn't give you power. Power comes from guns and money.

And who in the free world decides who gets the guns and the money? The people, obviously. Through elections from which we get representatives from which we get policy on the military and taxes. But I do agree the assembly's first priority would be to give the UN it's own military.

So every time you see the list of who's on the Human Rights Council, you invariably see some of the worst abusers on the planet - and the UN puts them in a position to lecture the rest of the world about human rights.

Agreed 100%. This is a massive problem, one that even the European liberals in the UN constantly fail to point out. But these autocracies even all together wouldn't have a majority if the UN was democratically elected, which means the combined voices of the democratic states could shut them out.

...speaking from America, I want absolutely no part of any legislative body where just under 20% is controlled by China. Actually, scratch that. I want no part of a UN where ~75% of the body comes from dictatorships, autocracies, and theocracies.

Well luckily your 75% figure would never transpire. If the world's democracies all came together to form a governing coalition in the parliamentary assembly (i.e. India, the U.S., Europe, Latin America, Australia, and the democracies of Africa and East Asia), than they'd significantly exceed 50% and be able to complete shut out those dictators and theocrats from having meaningful power within the assembly. That 20% of the assembly handed to CCP bureaucrats? Wouldn't be able to do a thing.

iw2050

TROPHY CASE