WEBSTER CITY, Iowa — Iowa Rep. Steve King defended Texas Sen. Ted Cruz from questions about his “natural born” status Thursday by distinguishing him from President Obama.
While speaking to reporters after a Cruz town hall, King — who endorsed the Texan’s 2016 bid in mid-November — argued that his candidate had an “extraordinary American experience” growing up while Obama did not.
“There are only two kinds of citizens, I’ll just make it real simple. There are two kinds of citizens: natural born and naturalized. There’s no question that Ted Cruz is a citizen,” King said. “So the only question you have to ask is is he natural born or naturalized. He’s not naturalized, he’s natural born. He was a citizen by virtue of his birth to his mother, who was an American citizen.”
“I have no doubt that Ted Cruz’s mother was born in the United States and that she has a birth certificate from the United States,” King added, before launching into the comparison between Cruz and Obama.
“Here’s what we have — we have a president of the United States who was not raised with an American experience, and I don’t think there’s any doubt about that. He was raised in Indonesia during the most formative years of his life. That’s not an American experience,” King said. “But Ted Cruz was raised with an American experience. It has no constitutional foundation, but it has a powerful logical foundation.”
“So if you have a president who was a natural born American citizen who was raised with an extraordinary American experience, which is easy to tell by listening to any of his speeches, that’s enough for Iowans,” King said.
King has spent the week traveling throughout Iowa with Cruz as part of the campaign’s six-day bus tour, which is set to conclude on Saturday.
This is not the first time King has made comments of this sort. In July 2014, King said that Obama’s heart “doesn’t beat the same” as other Americans when the National Anthem is played or the Pledge of Allegiance is said, adding that Obama did not have a true “American experience” as a child.
