Republican presidential hopeful Donald Trump on Thursday threatened to bring a lawsuit challenging rival Ted Cruz’s eligibility to serve as president — unless the Texas senator “clean[s] up his act.”
“If [Ted Cruz] doesn’t clean up his act, stop cheating, & doing negative ads, I have standing to sue him for not being a natural born citizen,” Trump said in a tweet.
{mosads}Trump promised at a January GOP presidential debate not to sue Cruz over the issue.
“I’m not bringing a lawsuit,” he said. “I promise. But the Democrats are going to bring a lawsuit.”
The billionaire businessman’s comments come after several of his supporters filed a federal lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of Cruz’s presidential run.
Cruz, a constitutional lawyer and former Texas solicitor general, has maintained that he is eligible to be president, noting the distinction between naturalized and natural-born citizen.
He was born in Canada to an American mother and Cuban father.
Article II, Section 1 of the Constitution states “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.”