AFP|Update: 04.04.2023
The US Constitution does not require the president to be Christian, contrary to a claim that has resurfaced in a Facebook post shared hundreds of times. The nation's supreme law explicitly prohibits any "religious test" as a prerequisite for public office but does require the president to be at least 35 years old, a natural born citizen and to have lived in the country for at least 14 years.
The claim was posted on Facebook here on March 4, 2023, and has since been shared more than 400 times.
"This is what the constitution of the 'grandfather of democratic countries' states," says part of the post's Burmese-language text, which was shared as an image.
It continues: "(By the Constitution of U.S.A) the president of the United States (including vice-president) has to be a Christian. Except for Christians, anyone who is a Jewish, Buddhist, Muslim, Sikh or Hindu is not allowed to work for the White House."
It was posted by an account that has voiced support for the military in Buddhist-majority Myanmar.
The United States has repeatedly condemned the military junta, which toppled the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi in February 2021, and called its rule "illegitimate".
Prior to the February 2021 coup, the country had seen surging Buddhist nationalism, with the cause of extremist monks receiving new support in 2017 when the army launched a brutal crackdown on the Muslim Rohingya, expelling more than half a million from the country.
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Comments on the post suggest some users believed the claim.
One user wrote: "Is this what they call democracy?"
"Go ask for your human rights there," said another.
The same claim previously circulated on Facebook here in October 2020, and was shared more than 500 times.
The claim, however, is false.
Constitutional requirementsThe US Constitution states in Article VI, Clause 3: "No religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States."
The eligibility requirements for the US president are also set out in Article II, Section 1, Clause 5.
It says the president must be at least 35 years of age, be a natural born citizen, and must have lived in the United States for at least 14 years.
Dov Levin, an assistant professor of international relations at the University of Hong Kong, told AFP the claim about a religious requirement for the US president is "complete misinformation".
He also said over email on March 30 that: "While the US Constitution was initially silent in this regard, the first amendment to the US Constitution, adopted shortly (1791) after the constitution came into force, also forbids the establishment of any official religion by the US federal government."
Levin added that this has been interpreted to mean "the US federal government maintains neutrality in regard to any aspect regarding religion and bans any US federal government discrimination on this basis on any US government hiring".
Officials who are not ChristianDespite a ban on religious requirements for public service, almost all the country's presidents have been Christian, according to the Pew Research Center. Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln are considered by scholars to not have had formal religious affiliation.
President Joe Biden's cabinet also includes several officials who come from non-Christian religious backgrounds, according to an article published by The Washington Post in January 2021.
They include Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Attorney General Merrick Garland, who are both Jewish.
Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, who also served under president Barack Obama, spoke about his Hindu faith in a Hindu American Foundation function in 2015.
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