WorldNetDaily Bails on Birthers

WND editor Joseph Farah endorses Ted Cruz while ignoring his eligibility issues -- and to justify the endorsement, Farah abandons the signature issue of WND for the past eight years.

By Terry Krepel
Posted 3/16/2016

Indeed, Farah has done so in the most surprising way: endorsing a presidential candidate who, under the strict (though never never court-sanctioned) definition of "natural born citizen" it has pushed for years, is even more ineligible to be president than it has claimed Obama to be.

Farah made his endorsement in his March 7 column:

I think Ted Cruz's history demonstrates he has the clearest, most Reaganesque vision of where the country needs to go in its much-needed recovery from eight years of Barack Obama. Cruz is principled, sophisticated and a solid conservative whose understanding of and commitment to the Constitution is unshakeable.

At a time when one of the three branches of the federal government, the Supreme Court, hangs in the balance, it is Ted Cruz who, without question, can be counted upon to nominate justices who will uphold the high standards of Antonin Scalia and the originalists.

Ted Cruz is the real deal. That's not to slight Donald Trump, who has played an invaluable role in this campaign – breaking the back of political correctness, presenting a positive vision forward for America and standing up to those who would prefer to see the nation borderless and rudderless.

If Trump turns out to be the winner of the GOP nomination, I will unhesitatingly support him.

But it's time to choose – between two.

For me the choice is clear – Ted Cruz.

Unmentioned anywhere in Farah's column: the issue of Cruz's eligibility.

Of course, Farah and WND have aggressively avoided pushing the birther issue on Cruz for fear of damaging his election chances; even when Trump made it an issue earlier this year, WND gave it only token coverage that was much fairer than the typical Obama birther report. Farah was curiously silent about his own doubts on the issue; back in 2013, he wrote that he doubts that Cruz is eligible under the standards WND tried to enforce on President Obama.

Farah went on to state that "it’s time for everyone, including Trump, to stop trashing his Republican competitors" and that "The two top Republicans need to stop the scathing attacks on each other and to focus on the real threat posed by the specter of the socialist and the criminal vying for the other party's nomination." Again, Farah failed to mention that among those "scathing attacks" is Trump going birther on Cruz.

(Farah's column rather laughably began with the editor's note: "The following column represents a personal political endorsement by Joseph Farah, the editor and founder of WND.com, and not a corporate editorial endorsement." As if there's any meaningful difference between the two; WND's editorial agenda has always been a direct reflection of Farah's right-wing, conspiratorial views.)

Needless to say, Farah's endorsement didn't go over well with WND's readership, which not only includes a lot of birther dead-enders but a lot of Donald Trump fans as well -- the endorsement column generated around 4,000 comments. Pissing off its own readers finally motivated WND to explain why it has refused to open up its can of birther whoop-ass on Cruz. Well, sorta.

An unbylined March 8 article noted the "thousands" of comments on Farah's column, "most, by far, focused on – Ted Cruz’s eligibility." (Curiously, eligibility didn't make the article's headline, which mentions only "Trump supporters" being critical of the endorsement.)

WND didn't explain why birther king Farah didn't mention Cruz's eligibility issues in his endorsement, but it did finally concede the existence of a 2013 column in which Farah doubted that Cruz was eligible. Then it and Farah spun away:

In fact, WND has carried numerous columns and reports on the eligibility for the presidency of Cruz, Rubio and others. Farah, ever at the tip of the spear on a news issue, wrote more than two years ago that he wasn’t sure, but suspected Cruz was not eligible, “at least not by my understanding of what the founders had in mind when they ratified the Constitution.”

But he was pointing out the double standard of the legacy media, which steadfastly refused to raise any questions about Barack Obama when nearly 100 lawsuits were brought from 2007 until about 2010 over his eligibility.

“Never mind that the only law enforcement investigation into Obama’s birth certificate found that it was a fraud and forgery. It didn’t matter. The media, besides WND, have steadfastly refused to report the facts for fear of being labeled part of the ‘birther’ conspiracy,” he wrote.

Then along comes Cruz, he wrote, and, “Every media outlet in the country is questioning his constitutional eligibility.”

Fast forward more than two years, and the endorsement of Cruz brought out hundreds of Joseph Farah’s detractors to WND.

He explained: “I was inundated with more than 100 emails eviscerating me for my personal endorsement of Ted Cruz. On the other hand, I received about a half dozen atta-boys. Most of the protests claimed Cruz is constitutionally ineligible – even though, as the candidate has explained, his mother was an American citizen at the time of his birth.

“As I have explained before, ad nauseam, from my point of view, when the Congress and courts abdicated their responsibility with regard to the questions of Barack Obama’s eligibility, a precedent was set. If Obama was not going to be held accountable to any standard during eight years as president, how could we hold others accountable?” he wrote.

“I was the one who saw this coming during the last eight years. That’s why I kept calling for a national dialogue that no one wanted to have. But as far as Ted Cruz goes, there is no doubt in my mind that he doesn’t have any allegiance to the country in which he was born – Canada. It’s a non-issue. Ted Cruz is the most pro-American official I know. He was also very forthcoming with his birth certificate. He has made his case on eligibility in the media. I have suggested to the campaign that it offer even more in the way of constitutional justification for his candidacy. However I was surprised by the outpouring of concern among many that he could be elected president and challenged successfully by the Democrats.”

That's a lot of subject-changing going on there.

First, WND's "numerous columns and reports on the eligibility for the presidency of Cruz" are actually not very many, and they are effectively zero compared with the literally hundreds of items WND published on Obama's eligibility. WND cannot plausibly suggest it has covered the two issues equally.

Second, the question is not what the "legacy media" did on eligibility issues, no matter how much WND and Farah want you to think otherwise -- besides, the media didn't cover it until Trump pushed the issue, and most of the media agreed Cruz, like Obama, is eligible. It's about the disparity of coverage at WND between Obama eligibility and Cruz eligibility.

Third, Farah's claim that "a precedent was set" by "Congress and courts" not getting into Obama eligibility, therefore "how could we hold others accountable?" is nothing but a cop-out. When has this stopped Farah or WND before?

Fourth, it clear that WND and Farah are apparently adjusting their "understanding" of what a "natural born citizen" is to keep Cruz from running afoul of it. As the WND article itself states, "From other, contemporaneous writings to the Constitution, it likely was understood then to have meant the offspring of two citizens of a country born in the country" (never mind that no court has endorsed it). But now he's suggesting that because Cruz's "mother was an American citizen at the time of his birth" and because Cruz "doesn’t have any allegiance to the country in which he was born – Canada," that's now sufficient for Farah to presume that Cruz is eligible.

Needless to say, that completely contradicts what Farah and WND have pushed when Obama's eligibility was in question. So, yeah, another cop-out.

Farah reiterated some of this, then spun some more, in his March 9 column:

Many have asked me, “What about the question of constitutional eligibility?”

My answer is direct: Obama and the establishment media have made a mockery of the Constitution in many ways, but none more than their attacks on the “natural born citizen” requirement. So much damage was done to that simple clause in the last eight years, I don’t believe there’s any going back.

You can’t even have a serious conversation about the eligibility issue any longer. So be it.

What I do know is that Ted Cruz loves America.

I could never say that about Obama.

The eligibility requirement of the Constitution was intended to protect the nation from foreign corruption, entanglements, intrigue, suspicion and conflicts of interest.

I don’t believe anyone in their right mind thinks Ted Cruz has any allegiance to either Canada or Cuba. This guy loves America with all of his heart, mind and soul.

And he’s demonstrated that fact with virtually everything he has said and done throughout his life.

When Ted Cruz tells you what he will do as president, you can take that promise to the bank. Why? Because he’s consistent. He’s committed. He’s passionate about America. He always has been. And he always will be.

That’s why he is my first choice for president.

No, "Obama and the establishment media" did not make a mockery of the "natural born citizen" clause and made it so you "can’t even have a serious conversation" about it -- Farah and WND did. And they are continuing to mock it by effectively declaring that their years of fulmination over the issue means nothing now that a conservative Republican, not a black Democrat, is the subject.

Farah devoted his March 10 column to cranking up the whining -- that his endorsement of Cruz was criticized, that he was "caricatured as a 'conspiracy theorist,' a 'birther' and vilified as a racist hatemonger" for his anti-Obama birther crusade (hey, if the shoe fits...), and that he's being called out for being insufficiently birther when it comes to Cruz.

Farah does is usual manhood-measuring, making sure we know that he is "the man who founded the first independent online news agency, a lifelong journalist who had won awards for investigative reporting, my work as a foreign correspondent and achievements running daily newspapers in major metropolitan markets." Farah also engages in some counterfactual revisionism on his birther crusade:

In 2011, I published “Where’s the Birth Certificate?” by Jerome Corsi, which instantly became the No. 1 best-selling book in the country. Within days, Obama dispatched aides to Hawaii to retrieve his “long-form birth certificate” – releasing an image that satisfied every single so-called “mainstream” media organization in the U.S. An Esquire magazine columnist wrote a column claiming falsely that I was withdrawing the book from the marketplace, setting off a frenzy by retailers to return tens of thousands of copies. We sued Esquire unsuccessfully for restraint of trade and defamation, but the process ended with split decision at the U.S. Court of Appeals level, one step below the Supreme Court.

What did force Obama into it, in fact, was Donald Trump going aggressively birther, something Farah and Corsi were advising him on behind the scenes. Funny how the usually self-aggrandizing Farah is now refusing to take credit for his behind-the-scenes work then or give Trump credit for going birther on both Obama and Cruz.

Farah also conveniently failed to mention that the reason his lawsuit against Esquire failed is because the Esquire post was clearly satire -- something Farah himself admitted until it became inconvenient to do so.

Farah dissembled further: "Meanwhile, WND actually investigated the suspicious document Obama released, which only served to raise more questions than it answered. The only law enforcement investigation of the document found it to be fraudulent." Actually, the only thing "fraudulent" was the investigation itself, sleazed into existence by Corsi and Joe Arpaio and incompetently run by Corsi and Mike Zullo, who (along with WND itself) deliberately ignored factual evidence that didn't conform to their birther conspiracy theories.

Then, bizarrely, Farah decided that he doesn't really know what a "natural born citizen" is -- despite his column carrying the headline "What is a 'natural born citizen?'" -- and that if he did, it doesn't matter now because he doesn't want to make the election about "eligibility." See how he punts:

As for me, I have studied the matter closely. But I do not pretend to be the last word. I have my opinions about the original intent of the founders. I have my opinions about what should be the standard definition. But I would be fooling myself if I thought anyone cared.

Anyway, the election was now upon us. I had a choice: I could make the election all about constitutional eligibility, or I could look at the candidates and determine for myself who would be the best president. Either way, my decision would not likely determine the outcome of the election.

I looked at all the records of all the candidates running and found Ted Cruz to be the one who, if elected, would most likely return our country to a foundation of liberty, the rule of law, equal justice and limited government. His entire life has been dedicated to advancing those principles.

If I were convinced he was not constitutionally eligible, I could not support him. But I am not the last word on such matters. That’s for every voter to decide for himself or herself – since neither government, the courts, nor the dominant media culture have any interest in doing so.

Those sincerely convinced a candidate is constitutionally ineligible have a moral obligation not to support him. I respect that. As for me, I am not persuaded Cruz is ineligible. I am, however, convinced he is the best candidate running for president.

This is a massive load of hypocritical hooey. Contrast Farah's suddenly convenient reticence to define who's eligible to run for president with a 2012 column in which he asserted that eligibility "cannot be ignored" regarding Marco Rubio, who isn't eligible because his parents didn't become U.S. citizens "four years after Marco Rubio was born." He cites numerous alleged legal precedents to claim that only a child born of two American citizens can be a "natural born citizen," adding that Obama is not "not eligible" and "never was" because "his father was a Kenyan student who never became a U.S. citizen. Therefore, he doesn't meet the test of eligibility."

But Cruz's father was not an American citizen at the time of his son's birth and didn't become one until 2005. Therefore, under the definition of "natural born citizen" Farah himself promulgated a few short years ago, Cruz is not eligible.

So why won't Farah come out and say that? Why has Farah abruptly decided that he is "not persuaded Cruz is ineligible" despite his own history of pushing an interpretation demonstrating the opposite? Why are they giving Cruz a pass it refused to give to Obama when, according to the definition they applied to Obama, Cruz is even more ineligible?

Because Cruz is a conservative Republican and Obama is not. It's that simple.

The fact that they won't give that straightforward answer should be taken as an admission that their birther crusade was never about the Constitution and completely about the personal and political destruction of Obama. They are abandoning birtherism because it no longer advances his and WND's political agenda.

Farah can't defend not going birther on Cruz, and he knows it -- and, more importantly, WND's readers know it. Abandoning its longtime true-believer birther fans just might be more destructive to the future of Farah's operation than its years of shoddy journalism.