10-Year-Old: Change Law So I Can Be POTUS

10-year-old says foreign adoption shouldn't dash her presidential ambitions
By Jenn Gidman,  Newser Staff
Posted Oct 29, 2015 11:11 AM CDT

Massachusetts is known for churning out its fair share of patriots, and Alena Mulhern is no exception. But when the Kingston 10-year-old first told her mom she hoped to be the president of the United States someday, Barbara Mulhern Caparell said, "Honey, unfortunately that's the only thing you can't be," per CBS Boston. Caparell wasn't trying to tell her daughter she wasn't capable of being the commander in chief—she simply wasn't eligible, since Alena had been adopted from China when she was 10 months old. Alena, not content to let the highest post in the nation escape her grasp, has now launched a campaign to change the Constitution so she can one day vie for the White House. "We should all have the opportunity to run for president," she said in front of a State House committee on Wednesday. "I am an American as much as you are and everyone else. … I don't really remember China that much. All I know is America."

As it stands now, only natural-born US citizens can run for president. Alena's resolution is asking Congress to tweak the 14th Amendment so that children born abroad but adopted by Americans could fall under the "natural-born citizens" umbrella, as long as at least one parent is a US citizen, the child is younger than 16 when adopted, and a few other conditions are met, the Patriot Ledger. Alena certainly has the drive, and the interest, for the job: The paper notes she has already made her intentions clear to President Obama, has been boning up on presidential facts, and even built a White House out of Legos after visiting DC in 2011. And if you're already wondering whether Alena is a Republican or Democrat, the answer is … neither: She tells the Patriot Ledger she'd run as an independent. (One day, Alena just may make this eclectic list.)

Get the news faster.
Tap to install our app.
X
Install the Newser News app
in two easy steps:
1. Tap in your navigation bar.
2. Tap to Add to Home Screen.

X