Exclusive: Cody Robert Judy Provides Breaking Update on His Presidential Eligibility Case at the Supreme Court

“GAINING THE EYE OF THE COURT ON THE ISSUE”

by Sharon Rondeau

(Jul. 2, 2015) — In a blog post on Thursday, 2008, 2012 and prospective 2016 presidential candidate Cody Robert Judy described how he had spoken with three clerks at the U.S. Supreme Court, where he has a case pending over the court’s three-month summer break alleging that Barack Hussein Obama, as an ineligible presidential candidate in 2008 and 2012, harmed Judy’s respective presidential campaigns, which he claims violate the Sherman Anti-Trust Act.

Judy’s lawsuit, Judy v. Obama 14-9396, was first filed last summer at the U.S. District Court for the District of Utah.  Judy named as defendants Barack Obama, aka Barry Soetoro; his political organization, Organizing for America, the Democratic National Committee (DNC), Rep. Nancy Pelosi and Sen. Harry Reid.

Judy maintains that Obama is ineligible because he does not meet the definition of “natural born Citizen,” as required by Article II, Section 1, clause 5 of the U.S. Constitution, by virtue of his non-U.S.-citizen father.  Barack Hussein Obama Sr. was a citizen of Great Britain and later, Kenya, after it achieved independence in December 1963.  Judy believes that “natural born Citizen” was meant by the Founders to mean “born in the country to two U.S.-citizen parents.”

The District court dismissed the case, upon which Judy appealed to the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals, which also dismissed it as frivolous.  However, upon appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, that body scheduled the case for conference on June 18.  The Supreme Court recesses at the end of June and routinely begins its new session on October 1.

After its receipt and docketing by the Supreme Court, Judy’s case was inexplicably renamed “Cody Robert Judy v. Barack H. Obama, President of the United States, et al.“

In an interview in late April, Judy informed The Post & Email that he solicited Amicus Curiae briefs on the meaning of “natural born Citizen” from attorneys admitted to argue before the U.S. Supreme Court.  On Thursday, he reported that not one responsive brief had been filed supporting or contesting the position taken in his lawsuit.

After the June 18 conference, the court did not dismiss the case.  Rather, it denied Judy’s application to proceed in forma pauperis, a term indicating that he does not have the financial means to pay the customary court fees and costs of copying and mailing.  On June 22, the court published its decision, which reads, “The motion of petitioner for leave to proceed in forma pauperis is denied. Petitioner is allowed until July 13, 2015, within which to pay the docketing fee required by Rule 38(a) and to submit a petition in compliance with Rule 33.1 of the Rules of this Court.”

While Judy said that the docketing fee is approximately $300, the costs of copying and mailing could run as much as $4,000.  In explaining in forma pauperis to his readers, Judy wrote, “This asks the Court to waive the filing fee, and an additional non-Court fee that entails the expense of printing 45-48 booklet style pamphlets of your Writ that can cost anywhere from two to four thousand dollars just to print and serve up.”

Judy was pleased that the case was not dismissed but mystified as to why the court had denied his request for in forma pauperis status given that he submitted personal financial documentation along with his lawsuit demonstrating that he is a man of very modest means.  He immediately called upon members of the public to support his efforts but told The Post & Email that donations have been relatively slow in arriving.

On June 23, Judy filed a Motion for Reconsideration on the in forma pauperis decision by overnight mail.  He believes that in persevering, he is upholding the U.S. Constitution and the rights of all Americans to access the courts, regardless of their financial situation.  The court acknowledged receipt of Judy’s motion, posting it on its website on June 24.

On Thursday, the Supreme Court indicated that it has scheduled a second conference on Judy’s latest motion for September 28, 2015.

In an exclusive interview, Judy told The Post & Email  that one of the three Supreme Court clerks to whom he spoke on Tuesday, Jeff, advised him to file the motion requesting an extension of time.  In that filing, sent by overnight mail on Tuesday evening, Judy revealed that he included a brief in which he claimed that Sen. Ted Cruz, Sen. Marco Rubio, and Gov. Bobby Jindal, all of whom are collecting campaign donations for their presidential candidacies, are similarly ineligible to seek the office of president.

One of the items Judy asked the court to consider is:

Rubio and Cruz have officially declared themselves candidates, whereas Jindal has formed an exploratory committee, a routine step toward becoming a candidate.  On his website on Thursday, Judy wrote, “In one stunning and sweeping Motion in the United States Supreme Court (SCOTUS) in Judy v. Obama 14-9396 U.S. Senator Cruz, U.S. Senator Rubio and Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal were squarely addressed with collecting contributions for an Office they are not qualified for.”

Jindal was born in the United States to two legally-admitted U.S. residents who were citizens of India; Cruz was born in Canada to a U.S.-citizen mother and Cuban-citizen father who at some point during the family’s residence there, became a Canadian citizen; and Rubio’s situation mirrors Jindal’s in that his parents were Cuban citizens when their son Marco was born in Florida.

On June 30, Yahoo! Global News Anchor Katie Couric interviewed Cruz and asked him if he believed the questions about his eligibility are valid.  Cruz responded by saying, “The whole ‘birther’ thing was started by the Hillary Clinton campaign in 2008 against Barack Obama…as a legal matter, the law is quite clear: that the child of a U.S. citizen born abroad is a citizen by birth, is a natural born Citizen.”

Cruz did not differentiate between the constitutional requirement of U.S. representatives and senators, which is “a Citizen,” along with age and residency requirements, and “natural born Citizen,” which was designated by the Framers only for the office of the president and “Command in chief.”

One week before Cruz announced his candidacy, two former solicitors general, one during the George W. Bush years and one during Obama’s tenure, wrote an editorial in which they opined that Cruz is eligible to seek the office, quoting the 1790 Naturalization Act, 1795 act of the same name, and the 14th Amendment, all of which came after the writing and ratification of the U.S. Constitution.

U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor is the justice who reviews emergency petitions from Utah.  Judy opined that Sotomayor has a reputation for defending the rights of average people against unlawful prosecutions.

“There are two motions in front of the court right now,” he said. “I’m not sure whether this conference was scheduled for September 28 based on my motion for review, which was received by the court on June 24, or if the September conference was scheduled because of my motion and affidavits for more time.  I”m not sure if Sotomayor has seen that.  It was delivered to the court on Wednesday; it was overnighted.”

Each overnight mailing costs $25.00.

“When I spoke to the clerk, he told me that the court doesn’t really look at in forma pauperis motions except when they’re in regular session.  So from that respect, I can understand that September 30 is the very first date that could be considered when they come back into session,” Judy explained.

“I always thought they recessed until October 1,” The Post & Email commented.  “I know; I did, too.  I was surprised to see ‘September,'” Judy responded.  Regarding the information imparted by Jeff, Judy then said:

When the court is recessed during this time, it is not recessed for active cases.  The justices don’t go home on vacation.  I just read this, and I was like, “Wow, that’s good!”  They may take a week off for the Fourth of July holiday, but they’re then back in court busy writing opinions and entertaining motions.  This is what the clerk told me yesterday:  They do consider motions in active cases during the recess.

Because my application for an extension of time arrived on June 30 and hasn’t been docketed on the court’s schedule yet – but we know it’s been delivered – the clerk suggested to me that the court would consider – they have to consider it because it has to do with the July 13th dismissal of my case if I don’t pay the fees – that motion for application has got to be decided by the justices, so they will be back in court to decide that.  That’s very, very exciting.

We’re going to get the justices’ eyes on this; I know we’re going to get it.  We’re going to get past the clerks and we’re going to get the justices’ eyes on it, and Sotomayor is going to have to put her reputation on the line.

I was so excited to find out in my conversation with the clerk that the court really doesn’t recess.  I had two confirmed sources:  the clerk, and I actually read it at the Supreme Court website.  It says that their schedule stops at the “end of June” but can go into the first few days of July.  I wrote that application, overnighted it, and got it in.  It’s signed June 30, when they were still in session.

The clerk stressed that my case would be dismissed on July 13th if I didn’t have that application for more time in.  We were on the chopping block.  That is an actionable thing that can happen during recess.  Even though they’re on recess, that’s when they scheduled it.

When The Post & Email asked Judy if he were aware of whether or not his brief alleging that Cruz, Jindal and Rubio are ineligible had been read by any of the justices, he said he was not.  He pointed out that it had not been docketed yet, but that the clerk told him that “it will probably be heard in July.”  He said he “used as justification” for his motion asking for more time the eligibility question surrounding the three new candidates.  “What I’m actually doing in the application for time extension is justifying the reasons the court should actually be using this summer recess time as a time for parties to file BIOs (Briefs in Opposition) and grant my Cert (Writ of Certiorari),” he explained.

“If you go back and read the Reconsideration for the in forma pauperis on the June 24, you also see that I started to insert the ‘natural born Citizen’ dialog.  I inserted ‘the cause.’  I haven’t just talked about the particular issue.  The reason I did that is that I know these justices probably have not read my Writ of Certiorari yet.  With these motions, we are gaining the eye of the court on the issue,” Judy said.