Orly Taitz

On February 3, Malihi recommended that President Obama remain on the ballot. Concerning Taitz's case Malihi wrote: "The Court finds the testimony of the witnesses, as well as the exhibits tendered, to be of little, if any, probative value, and thus wholly insufficient to support plaintiffs’ allegations". The Drudge Retort described the hearing as "Empty Table 1, Orly Taitz 0".

Taitz has stated that 2016 Republican presidential candidates Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, and Bobby Jindal were not natural-born citizens and therefore were ineligible for the office they sought.

In March 2015, Taitz filed a third lawsuit in Texas, alleging the federal government's grant of asylum and refuge status encouraged undocumented immigrants to engage in identity theft. She also alleged President Obama was using a stolen Social Security number, forged identification documents, and a false name. Taitz's attempt to join this lawsuit with the first suit that she filed in Texas failed.

In May 2014, in response to the National Basketball Association banning Donald Sterling for making racist remarks, Taitz filed a "complaint" with the NBA, requesting that it also ban Shaquille O'Neal because he, in Taitz's opinion, "publicly bullied" a disabled person.

In July 2014, Taitz filed a lawsuit challenging the transfer of undocumented immigrants from South Texas to other states, claiming they would spread communicable diseases. The U.S. government opposed Taitz's lawsuit, arguing she lacked standing and was trying to "entangle the judiciary in her political quarrels." At a hearing held on August 27, 2014, the court denied Taitz's request for a temporary restraining order, but permitted her to amend her lawsuit. In her amended complaint, in addition to her claims about communicable diseases, Taitz claimed that unknown parties pressured a border patrol agent to not testify on her behalf; she also claimed the NSA and FBI have placed agents in the federal courts to tamper with documents. In July 2015, the court dismissed almost of all Taitz's lawsuit, ruling she lacked standing to challenge the federal government's immigration practices.

In December 2014, Taitz filed a second lawsuit in Texas, alleging the Centers for Disease Control failed to provide her with information she requested about Ebola and other communicable diseases in the United States. Because the information Taitz sought was not in Texas, the court transferred the case to a court in Southern California, where Taitz resides.

Taitz filed paperwork indicating her intent to become the California Attorney General in the 2014 blanket primary. Taitz was endorsed by David Manning. Judson Phillips, leader of the Tea Party Nation, accused Taitz of falsely implying that the organization had endorsed her when it had not.

Believing that the death of Loretta Fuddy (the director of the Hawaii Department of Health) was not an accident, Taitz sued the Hawaiian Memorial Park Mortuary in Federal district court on December 20, 2013, to prevent a cremation. Taitz withdrew her petition on January 9, 2014 and the suit was dismissed the following day.

In December 2013, in response to A&E suspending Phil Robertson, Taitz filed an administrative complaint in Colorado that accused A&E was "engaged in discrimination against heterosexuals in favor of homosexuals, engaged in discrimination of religious people, particularly Christians, in favor of godless atheists".

In February 2012, Taitz sued the Mississippi state Democratic Party and the Mississippi Secretary of State alleging President Obama was not a natural born citizen. Taitz accused the party of aiding and abetting in forgery and fraud when it submitted to the court a copy of President Obama's birth certificate. In response, the party filed with the court a certified verification from Hawaii's State Registrar attesting to the accuracy of President Obama's birth certificate. Taitz accused the registrar of being complicit with the forgery.

In September 2012, Taitz attempted to address a Kansas state board that had been reviewing a challenge to President Obama's placement on the ballot, but her request to speak was denied. After the hearing was over, Taitz and an Obama supporter argued, and eventually both were escorted out of the building by a police officer. Taitz claimed that during the post-hearing confrontation she was threatened by African-American men behaving like "animals" and "thugs"; two Topeka community leaders who were present labeled Taitz's remarks as "inaccurate" and "racist".

On September 20, Taitz filed a lawsuit in state court seeking to stay the board's actions. On November 2, 2012, the court dismissed Taitz's suit due to her lack of standing.

On December 13, 2012, Taitz filed in Sacramento, California a lawsuit on behalf of James Grinols (a Republican elector from Minnesota), Robert Odden (a Libertarian elector from Minnesota), Keith Russell Judd (a federal prisoner who was on the West Virginia Democratic primary ballot), Edward Noonan (who won the American Independent Party presidential primary in California), and Thomas MacLeran (who filed to run as a Republican for president) seeking to prevent Congress from certifying the Electoral College's vote. The lawsuit also sought to prevent California officials from certifying the election results from the 2012 presidential election. On January 3, 2013, District Judge Morrison C. England Jr. denied the plaintiffs' request for a temporary restraining order to prevent Congress from certifying the Electoral College's vote. At the hearing, the judge told Taitz, "Your argument, it doesn't make any sense whatsoever," and at one point asked, "Why do you keep filing these lawsuits when they keep getting rejected?" In April 2013, the court dismissed the suit. In November 2015, the 9th Circuit affirmed the district court's dismissal.

In June 2012, Taitz was retained by a medical marijuana activist who had been arrested while attempting to gather signatures for a ballot initiative.

Taitz attempted to challenge U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein in the 2012 blanket primary, stating, "I think I do have a chance specifically because I do speak Spanish and I speak Hebrew." In November 2011, Taitz trailed Feinstein by a nearly 2–1 margin. A Feinstein advisor stated, "If this race plays out as a bunch of unknowns who have no serious funding, Orly Taitz will probably win the primary [along with Feinstein]." (In 2012, California used a blanket primary campaign system for offices other than U.S. President, so that the top two finishers in the primary regardless of party affiliation go on to the ballot in the fall general election.)

A March 2012 poll by another Republican candidate had Taitz leading the Republican field; 38% of those polled had not decided whom to vote for. On March 11, the California Republican Party endorsed another candidate, Elizabeth Emken, over Taitz. Citing fears the election might be "rigged", Taitz announced her intention to work with Sharron Angle to ensure "a fair and honest election".

On June 5, 2012, Emken came in second to Feinstein in the primary with about 12% of the vote and advanced to the general election; Taitz came in fifth with 3.1%.

In July 2012, Taitz sued to block the certification of the primary election results, alleging "rampant election fraud"; she also alleged Obama engaged in "identity fraud." Her suit was denied.

In October 2012, Taitz tried to revive her election lawsuit by asking the court to compel Occidental College to produce student records for President Obama, who attended Occidental from 1979 to 1981. The judge ruled that Taitz's motion did not meet basic legal requirements and ordered her to pay $4,000 in sanctions to Occidental's lawyer for the cost of opposing the motion. The California Court of Appeal affirmed the dismissal and sanctions.

In the meantime, on August 9, the federal government filed an abstract of judgment, a document placing a lien in the amount of $20,000 plus interest on all her real property, prompting Taitz to say, "I will pay the money, and I will continue fighting," should it happen that her application for stay is ultimately denied and that the Supreme Court consents to her request to authenticate Justice Thomas's signature. On August 16, after being resubmitted to Associate Justice Samuel Alito, who in turn referred it to the full court, the application for stay was again denied. On January 10, 2011, the Court declined, without comment, to hear the case.

In February 2011, Taitz filed, in propria persona, a Freedom of Information Act suit against the commissioner of the Social Security Administration, alleging the agency improperly refused to disclose to her information about President Obama's social security number. After Taitz repeatedly failed to follow the court rule regarding the redaction of social security numbers in court filings, Chief Judge Lamberth wrote that Taitz "is either toying with the Court or displaying her own stupidity... There is no logical explanation she can provide as to why she is now wasting the Court's time, as well as the staff's time, with these improper redactions." On August 30, 2011, the court granted summary judgment in favor of the government, writing "As her numerous filings with the Court demonstrate, plaintiff will stop at nothing to get to the bottom of this alleged conspiracy. Unfortunately for plaintiff, today is not her lucky day."

In August 2011, Taitz filed, in propria persona, a suit against the director of the Hawaii Department of Health, seeking to review Obama's "long form" birth certificate. On October 12, 2011, the Hawaii Circuit Court dismissed Taitz's suit.

Taitz sought to compel White House Counsel Kathryn Ruemmler under FOIA to grant access to President Obama's "long form" birth certificate. On October 17, 2011, Chief Judge Lamberth noted Taitz's "Sisyphean quest" and dismissed the suit.

In November 2011, Taitz, backed by four New Hampshire state legislators, filed a complaint with the state's Ballot Law Commission challenging President Obama's eligibility to compete in the primary election. As Obama had paid the filing fee and his declaration of candidacy conformed to state law, the Commission unanimously voted to keep Obama on the ballot. The Commission then denied a request for reconsideration.

A lawsuit filed by an Alabama citizen, Albert Hendershot, in December 2011 alleged President Obama's birth certificate was forged and that he was ineligible to be on the Alabama primary ballot. Taitz agreed to represent Hendershot and sought to enter the case, but it was dismissed before she could make an appearance.

In April 2011, Lawrence O'Donnell invited Taitz on MSNBC so that she could address President Obama's long form birth certificate, which had been released the day before. When Taitz only wanted to make false claims about President Obama's alleged Selective Service papers and refused to comment on his birth certificate, O'Donnell kicked her off the show, stating: "Look, she's crazy. I invited a crazy person on this show to see if the crazy person ... could say something responsive, something human, to the document that was released today ... and she wants to play with all of her other kids' toys."

Upon learning of Land's ruling, Taitz said she would appeal the sanction, declaring that Judge Land was "scared to go against the regime" of the "oppressive" Obama administration, and that the sanction was an attempt to "intimidate" her. On March 15, 2010, the Eleventh Circuit affirmed the sanctions against Taitz, ordering her to pay the $20,000 fine.

In July 2010, Taitz applied to the U.S. Supreme Court to stay the enforcement of sanctions, arguing that "allowing sanctions by judge Land to stand will signify beginning of tyranny in the United States of America and end to the Constitutional Republic which is the foundation of this nation". On July 8, the application was submitted to Associate Justice Clarence Thomas; on July 15, he denied it. Doubting that Justice Thomas signed the denial order, Taitz claimed to have requested of Chief Justice John Roberts that Thomas's signature be presented to her for verification.

On January 27, 2010, Taitz, in propria persona, filed a petition for writ of quo warranto. On April 14, 2010, U.S. District Court Chief Judge Royce C. Lamberth dismissed the petition, stating that "the Court is not willing to go tilting at windmills with her."

In March 2010, Taitz qualified to run for the office of California Secretary of State. At the same time, she unsuccessfully challenged the eligibility of her Republican Party primary opponent, former NFL player Damon Dunn, claiming that he was pretending to be a Republican. Dunn had registered as a Democrat in the state of Florida in 1999, but that registration had lapsed before he filed for the Republican primary.

On May 12, 2010, Pamela Barnett (named plaintiff from Taitz's lawsuit Barnett v. Obama) filed a lawsuit in the Sacramento County Superior Court alleging that Dunn was not eligible to run for Secretary of State.

On June 17, 2010, Taitz filed a lawsuit in the Orange County Superior Court contesting the election results, again alleging Dunn's ineligibility. On March 17, 2011, the judge ruled against Taitz. On May 1, 2012, a California Court of Appeal affirmed the superior court's ruling.

In November 2008, Taitz filed a lawsuit on behalf of independent presidential candidate Alan Keyes, suing California's secretary of state, Debra Bowen, for allegedly failing to ascertain President Obama's eligibility for president before placing him on the ballot. The case was dismissed on May 4, 2009. The U.S. Supreme Court declined without comment to review the case on October 3, 2011.

Taitz filed a lawsuit on behalf of Pamela Barnett, Alan Keyes, other candidates in the 2008 federal elections, several military personnel, and some legislators from various states alleging that President Obama was ineligible to be president. On October 29, 2009, U.S. District Court Judge David O. Carter dismissed the lawsuit. The dismissal criticized Taitz's legal abilities, stated her behavior was "unethical", and suggested that Taitz "may have suborned perjury". On December 22, 2011, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirmed the dismissal. On June 11, 2012, the U.S. Supreme Court declined, without comment, a request by litigants not represented by Taitz to hear the case.

Taitz represented Stefan F. Cook, a major in the United States Army Reserve, who challenged orders implementing his voluntary deployment to Afghanistan because of his claim that President Obama was not a legitimate president. The case was dismissed when the Army Reserve revoked his order to deploy. Taitz filed an appeal in the Eleventh Circuit, which was dismissed on November 24, 2009, due to a failure to prosecute the appeal.

In September 2009, Taitz was retained by Captain Connie Rhodes, a U.S. Army physician. Rhodes sought a restraining order to prevent her forthcoming deployment to Iraq. In the request for a restraining order, Taitz argued the deployment order was illegal since Obama was illegally serving as President. On September 16, federal judge Clay D. Land rejected the motion and denounced it as frivolous. In his opinion, the judge noted that Rhodes had not previously raised any objections to orders she had received from Obama since he had been sworn in. He noted that while she seemed to have "conscientious objections" to taking orders from Obama, she did not seem to object to serving under him "as long as she is permitted to remain on American soil". Land then upbraided Taitz for using military officers as pawns to further her claims that Obama was not qualified to be President. He also expressed astonishment at Taitz's apparent misunderstanding of American judicial fundamentals, saying that she was trying to make Obama " 'prove his innocence' to 'charges' that are based upon conjecture and speculation".

A few hours later, a letter bearing Rhodes's signature arrived, stating that Taitz filed the motion without her knowledge or consent, asking Land to remove Taitz as her attorney of record in the case, and stating that it was her "plan to file a complaint with the California State Bar due to [Taitz's] reprehensible and unprofessional actions". On September 26, 2009, Taitz filed a motion with the court seeking to withdraw as counsel for Rhodes, so she could divulge in court "privileged attorney-client communications" since the dismissed Rhodes case "is now a quasi-criminal prosecution of the undersigned attorney, for the purpose of punishment".

On October 13, 2009, Judge Clay Land ordered "Counsel Orly Taitz ... to pay $20,000 to the United States, through the Middle District of Georgia Clerk's Office, within thirty days of the date of this Order as a sanction for her misconduct in violation of Rule 11 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure." Land's decision stated:

Taitz received media attention in connection with President Obama eligibility questions in late 2008. She was interviewed by co-hosts David Shuster and Tamron Hall on MSNBC on August 3, 2009. Various media outlets described her appearance on the network as an "implosion", while Taitz asserted that Shuster, who is Jewish, was a "brownshirt", a charge she would repeat in a phone interview the following week.

Fox News commentator Bill O'Reilly called Taitz a "nut". In response, she and pastor James David Manning organized a protest outside Fox News headquarters in New York City in November 2009, which drew an estimated 15 to 20 attendees.

Taitz filed an emergency petition in the California Supreme Court in 2008 on behalf of Libertarian vice presidential candidate Gail Lightfoot to stop the certification of California's 2008 election results because of the challenge to President Obama's eligibility. The California Supreme Court denied the petition, and the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear the case.

Before her national news exposure, Taitz was quoted in The Orange County Register in 2006 supporting Israeli military actions against Hamas and Hezbollah, and downplaying the impact of the espionage trial of two American Israel Public Affairs Committee staffers. (Charges against both were subsequently dropped.) Taitz has also said that she lost relatives in the Holocaust and that her grandmother witnessed the Kishinev pogrom.

Orly Taitz was born to a Jewish family in Chișinău, Moldavian SSR, in the Soviet Union (present-day Moldova). Both of her parents were science teachers. In 1981, Taitz immigrated to Israel, where she obtained a dentistry degree at Hebrew University. In 1987, she met Yosef Taitz who proposed four months later. Taitz immigrated to the United States in May 1987, marrying the Latvian-born Yosef in Las Vegas. Taitz became a naturalized United States citizen in 1992. She received her law degree from Taft Law School and was admitted to practice law in California in December 2002.

Orly Taitz (born August 30, 1960) is a Moldovan-American political conspiracy theorist. A dentist, lawyer, and former real estate agent, Taitz was a figure in the "birther" movement, which promoted the conspiracy theory that President Obama was not a natural-born citizen eligible to serve as President of the United States. Taitz also promotes a number of other conspiracy theories both related and unrelated to President Obama. Taitz has initiated a number of lawsuits on behalf of the "birther" movement; all were dismissed by the courts, and on one occasion Taitz was ordered to pay $20,000 as a sanction for misconduct in filing frivolous claims. Taitz has unsuccessfully run for statewide office in California three times.