Birtherism is back, but Kamala Harris, born in California, is eligible to be president

Birtherism is back, it seems, now that support is coalescing around Vice President Kamala for the Democratic presidential nomination after President Joe Biden dropped out of the race and endorsed her.

"Unless proven with court documents at the time of Kamala’s birth, her parents were not U.S. citizens," said text under a copy of Harris’ birth certificate shared July 21 on Instagram. "They were foreign students. At the time of her birth, she was the daughter of non-citizens. This makes her an anchor baby. She is not eligible to hold the office of president."

We found similar claims shared on other social media platforms following Biden’s July 21 announcement.

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Claims that politicians aren’t eligible to be president began in earnest in the 2008 presidential election cycle when then-Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., first ran for the White House. Some people baselessly questioned whether he was really born in Hawaii — a false line of attack later fueled by Donald Trump before Trump launched his own presidential campaign. Past Republican presidential candidates Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, (born in Canada to a U.S. citizen mother) and Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., (born in the Panama Canal Zone to two U.S. citizens) have faced similar scrutiny.

PolitiFact has debunked these claims about Harris before, but because the claims surfaced again following her July 21 announcement that she intends to seek the presidency, we’re taking a fresh look.

Harris’ parents, Donald Harris and Shyamala Gopalan, met while they were students at the University of California, Berkeley. They married but separated when Harris was 5 years old, Harris wrote in her 2019 book, "The Truths we Hold: An American Journey." 

A copy of Harris’ birth certificate posted online in August 2020 by the Bay Area News Group to accompany a San Jose Mercury News article shows Donald Harris was born in Jamaica and Gopalan was born in India. It does not show their citizenship status. 

Donald Harris’ biography at Stanford University, where he was an economics professor, shows that, at some point, he became a naturalized U.S. citizen. Gopalan, who died of cancer in 2009, became a breast cancer researcher whose work took her around the world. We could find no evidence she became a U.S. citizen.

Gopalan moved to Montreal for a teaching position when Harris was in middle school. Kamala Harris later left Montreal to attend Howard University in Washington, D.C., her book said.

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As of July 23, 2024, “Trump has announced he won’t debate Kamala Harris.”

Harris’ birth certificate shows she was born in 1964 at a hospital in Oakland, California, in Alameda County.

Legal experts told PolitiFact that’s all that’s needed to show Harris is eligible to be president. Her parents’ citizenship status when she was born isn’t a factor.

(Instagram screenshot)

"Yes, she is unquestionably eligible," Columbia University law professor Jessica Bulman-Pozen said.

She pointed to the U.S. Constitution’s Article 2, which states that: "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."

"As someone born in the United States, Harris is a ‘natural born citizen,’" Bulman-Pozen said.

University of Pennsylvania law professor Kermit Roosevelt said the Constitution’s 14th Amendment "is very clear that people born in the U.S. are citizens."

"The only exception is for children of foreign diplomats, who are not subject to the jurisdiction of the United States."

The 14th 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."

Bulman-Pozen said there have been debates about the eligibility of people born outside the U.S. to U.S.-citizen parents, as McCain was, but said "there is no plausible argument that someone born in the U.S. is not a natural born citizen."

"If there was any doubt, section one of the 14th Amendment confirms the U.S. norm of birthright citizenship," she said.

Harris was born in California, which means she is a natural-born citizen. Therefore, we rate the claim that Harris is ineligible to be president because her parents were not U.S. citizens at her time of birth as Pants on Fire!