Update: What is the State Department Hiding About Stanley Ann Dunham?

WAS SHE IN HAWAII OR OVERSEAS FROM 1961-64?

by Sharon Rondeau

(May 4, 2011) — Following a lawsuit filed by Mr. Christopher Strunk against the U.S. State Department which resulted in the release of some of Stanley Ann Dunham’s passport applications and travel records, The Post & Email contacted Mr. Jonathan Rolbin at the State Department, whose cover letter to Strunk had implied that the remainder of her records had been ordered destroyed in the 1980s.

Since Mr. Rolbin’s letter to Strunk stated that the General Services Administration was responsible for ordering the destruction of passport files, we  first contacted that agency.  The GSA denied ever issuing such a mandate.  Another researcher contacted the GSA independently and was told the same thing.

The GSA suggested that we contact Mr. Jay Olin, Deputy FOIA Officer at the NARA.  On September 18, 2010, we did so, requesting “any and all documentation that such a directive was given by the NARA” regarding the destruction of passport records during the 1980s.

After several months, we concluded that the NARA was not going to respond to our FOIA request.  However, in early March, we received a letter from Mr. Olin stating that he had gathered all of the available information pertaining to any discussion of destruction of passport records during the specified time frame.

In his letter, Mr. Olin acknowledged that our request was received on September 23, 2010 and apologized for his delayed response.  The second paragraph of his letter reads:

We conducted an exhaustive search of our records and did not locate any directive issued when we were part of the General Services Administration or after our designation as an independent agency in 1985.  We located 2 documents regarding passport applications stored by State at the Washington National Records Center.  After consultation with State, these documents are released to you in full.  This concludes the processing of your request.

The following are the documents we received from Mr. Olin.  Pages with dates indicate “1982” or “1983.”

Therefore, Mr. Rolbin’s claim that the GSA had ordered the destruction of passport records was refuted, and the GSA’s referral of the matter to the NARA uncovered no such mandate or policy declaration.

In the same envelope, we also received a form letter from the State Department stating that “The records you have requested do not appear to be State Department records” signed by a Wilma Manning.  Since our most recent request had not been for the passport applications themselves, we interpreted this to mean that a record of any directive to destroy passport records is not contained in any State Department files.

According to page 2 above, the State Department should have maintained Stanley Ann Dunham’s passport records, as it states:

The majority of Department of State records (excluding passport and visa records) which are 25 years or older are transferred to the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) in accordance with Title 22, Code of Federal Regulations…(emphasis ours)

If passport records are retained by the State Department, where are those of Stanley Ann Dunham for the years 1961-1964?  Where did Jonathan Rolbin obtain the authority to state that the GSA had ordered certain passport records destroyed?  Why can no one verify his statement, not even he himself?

Documents obtained by Heather Smathers of the Arizona Independent show that Barack Obama Sr. had given two different birth dates, 1934 and 1936, on his visa applications and provided conflicting information on whether or not he had a child in the country.  It is reported that the documentation was released by the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), which had been part of the Department of Justice (DOJ) prior to the 9/11 terror attacks.  It was then was renamed the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) and became part of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).

Obama Sr. was asked to leave the country after it was discovered that he had at least two wives.  He had overstayed his student VISA, which had expired on July 8, 1964, leaving the United States on July 22, 1964 as documented in a Report of Investigation (page 7).  The INS based its decision to deny Obama an extension on information in his Harvard University file. On page 18 of the INS disclosures, a file letter written by M.F. McKeon stated that Harvard was “going to try to cook something up to ease him out.”

Harvard had followed through and advised Obama Sr. to return to Kenya at the end of April 1964 (page 17), stating that “this office has no money of its own for foreign students.  We have, therefore, come to the conclusion that you should terminate your stay in the United States and return to Kenya to carry on your research and the writing of your thesis.”

In several places, Obama listed his wife as “Ann Obama” or “Ann S. Obama.”  On an extension application made in April 1964, he listed one child as Barack Obama 2nd and his age as “2 yrs.”  On page 25, he neglected to write in his wife’s or wives’ names, and a handwritten note said, “He is married.”

On page 27, Obama Sr. indicated that he had a son, “Roy Obama,” but failed to provide his address.  He stated that he was married but did not give the name of his wife.  At times, Obama Sr. claimed a Baltimore, MD address for himself, and at others, a Cambridge, MA address when he was attending Harvard.  He also lived in Honolulu while attending the University of Hawaii.

Why did Obama Sr. have so many different addresses while in the United States?  He also had several different addresses while attending the University of Hawaii.

On an application for part-time employment at the University of Hawaii, Obama stated that he had “permission to stay” in the U.S. until “8-8-1960” (page 41).  However, on page 43, he stated that his permission to remain was “unlimited.”  On page 47, he stated that his permission to stay expired on August 8, 1960 with an “unlimited renewal of visa.”  Is a visa renewal ever “unlimited?”

On the same page, he neglected to answer the question about his marital status.

Page 32 indicates that Obama Sr.’s “country of citizenship” is “Africa.”

On page 34, a handwritten note dated 8/31/61 indicated that Obama’s wife, presumably Stanley Ann Dunham, had planned to attend “Washington State University next semester,” which appears to support The Post & Email’s research that she did not begin studies until September 1961, and the school was the University of Washington.

Stanley Ann Dunham also provided inconsistent information in the passport applications which Christopher Strunk was able to obtain, including two marriage dates to the same man and two different birth dates for her second husband, Lolo Soetoro.

Her son, Barack Hussein Obama II, has provided the names of two different hospitals where he was born, and neither one will confirm that he was born there.

On page 21 of the INS release, a memo signed by the same M. F. McKeon states that “After alien stated he was married, he said he was separated and thatthey [sic] may get a divorce.  The wife in the Philippines from whom he is separated is a U.S.C.  Memo on yellow paper in file indicates he had wife in Kenya when he arrived in U.S. in 1959.”

There was evidently another woman with whom Obama Sr. was at least somewhat involved as reported on several pages of the information released by the INS, particularly page 23.  The woman had apparently made trips back and forth from Cambridge, MA to London, England and had contact with Obama Sr.  She apparently lost her sponsorship by the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee.

According to Wikipedia, Stanley Ann Dunham was attending the University of Hawaii in 1963 and 1964 while “her parents helped her raise the young Obama.”  Will this entry in Wikipedia now be scrubbed, as references to the term “natural born Citizen” have been in recent days?

Other reports also state that Dunham was in Hawaii from 1961 to 1964.  But was she?  Was “the wife in the Philippines” Stanley Ann Dunham or a different wife?  If it was Dunham, was she visiting in the Philippines or there on a long-term basis?  If she was there for an extended period of time, why was she there?

Obama signed an order relating to FOIA requests on his first day of usurping the presidency, stating:

The Government should not keep information confidential merely because public officials might be embarrassed by disclosure, because errors and failures might be revealed, or because of speculative or abstract fears,” Obama said in the FOIA memo, adding later that “In responding to requests under the FOIA, executive branch agencies (agencies) should act promptly and in a spirit of cooperation, recognizing that such agencies are servants of the public.

However, up until April 27, 2011, when Obama revealed a “certified copy” of his alleged long-form birth certificate from Hawaii, he had not released one piece of information about himself, and the various departments of the federal government have also come up short.  The Post & Email’s questions regarding Obama’s Selective Service registration were also stonewalled.

If the age of the father is incorrect, does it invalidate the entire thing?

In February 2009, Mr. Kenneth Allen of Arizona made a FOIA request for the travel records of Barack Hussein Obama, aka Barry Soetoro; Lolo Soeotoro and Ann Dunham Obama Soetoro. His request was ignored.  On July 6, 2009, Allen filed a lawsuit to obtain the documentation.  When The Post & Email followed up with Mr. Allen in an article dated May 24, 2010, he contended that the Department of State had the documents he had requested on Stanley Ann Dunham Obama Soetoro.

A judge had ordered that Barack Hussein Obama, aka Barry Soetoro’s information could be withheld but that the requested documents on Stanley Ann Dunham Obama Soetoro and Lolo Soetoro should be released.  The Department of State had continued to stonewall even after the judge’s order was issue, so Allen filed a Motion to Compel on May 24, 2010.

On July 29, 2010, Mr. Allen received some of the documents he had requested from the State Department.  Their letter to him references one document “divided into nine for processing purposes.”  Of the nine sections, the State Department said that “four may be released in full, and five must be withheld in full.”

So what is the State Department hiding?  Which information could not be released?  In its release to Allen, the State Department claimed exemption (b)(3)INA, which states:

INA The Immigration and Nationality Act, Title 8 USC Section 1202(f)

Why has information been withheld from the American people on Stanley Ann Dunham Obama Soetoro, Lolo Soeotor and Barack Hussein Obama, aka Barry Soetoro?  Is it because Obama was naturalized at some point?

Mr. Allen and Mr. Strunk received the information they had respectively requested on the same day, July 29, 2010.

Update, May 4, 2011: The Post & Email has just learned that Mr. Strunk has submitted a new filing in his lawsuit against the Department of State and Department of Homeland Security regarding his initial FOIA request.

As of April 1, 2011, the U.S. State Department began requiring more detailed information from U.S. citizens in order to obtain a passport.  The new rule is titled, “New U.S. Birth Certificate Requirement.”  Passports can reportedly be denied if a proper “birth certificate” is not presented when applying.  An agency which assist people in obtaining passports on an expedited basis states:

Official Birth Certificates are kept on file in the locality where the birth took place. The Federal Government does not keep birth certificates on file. These records are permanently kept of file in the vital statistics office of a particular city, state or county. To obtain a certified copy of a Birth Certificate, write to or visit the vital statistics office in the area where you were born.

The State Department lists “conviction of an act of treason” as a “potentially expatriating act.”

Would Obama be able to obtain a passport under these new rules?  Many analysts have deemed the White House birth certificate a forgery, and it is possible that Obama is not even a U.S. citizen, despite the insistence of many cheerleaders masquerading as journalists providing cover for him.  Besides, the constitutional requirement to serve as President is “natural born Citizen,” not “citizen.”

Second Update, May 4, 2011: A reader has found policies by which passport information has apparently been governed since 1999.  The policies indicate that the essential parts of the passport documents must be retained for records dating between 1956 and 1961 and that non-essential parts could be then be destroyed if a five-year period of inactivity ensued.  That was the case with Stanley Ann Dunham, who applied for a U.S. passport every five years through the 1980s.  Information from 1965 through the 80s was released, so the question still remains, “Where are her records from prior to 1965?”

A link dealing specifically with passport records states that records more than 50 years old are sent to the National Archives and are not destroyed.

On May 3, 2011, in the Strunk FOIA lawsuit, the State Department filed an order for the plaintiff, Christopher Strunk, to submit his response to the State Department’s renewed motion for summary judgment by May 27, 2011.