2013 D e c i sion s O p inion s of the U nit e d S t a t e s C our t of Appe al s for the Thir d C ir c uit

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- 341 NOT PRECEDENTIAL UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT

___________ No. 13

- 2520

___________ BRIAN T. CHRISTIE ,

Appellant

v. PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

.

____________________________________ On Appeal from the United States District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania (D.C. Civil No. 2

- 13

- cv - 0 0596 ) District Judge: Honorable Mark R. Hornak

____________________________________ Submitted for Possible Summary Action Pursuant to Third Circuit LAR 2 7.4 and I

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. 10.6

July 18, 2013 Before: FUENTES, FISHER and VANASKIE , Circuit Judges

(Opinion filed : July 29, 2013 )

_________ OPINION

_________ PER CURIAM Brian Christie, pro se, appeals from the District Court’s sua sponte dismissal of his

c omplaint for lack of subject matter jurisdiction. Appellee, the President of the United2

States, moves for summary action pursu ant to Local Appellate Rule 27.4. For the reasons that follow, we will summarily affirm. See LAR 27.4 ; I

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. 10.6. Christ i e’s complaint alleged that President Barack Obama has committed , and continues to commit, high treason against the United States in various ways . 1 The District Co urt dismissed the complaint be cause Christie lacked standing, among other

reasons. The Distr ict Court also denied leave to amend as futile. We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291. We exercise plenary review over the District Court’s dismissal for lack of subject matter jurisdiction

. See Berg v. Obama , 586 F.3d 234, 238 (3d Cir. 2009). W e take the factual allegations of Christie’s complaint

as true in assessing whether he has met his burden to establish standing. See id

. (citations omitted). To have standing under Article III, a plaintiff must have an injury

- in

- fact which is 1) concret e and particularized to him, and 2) actual or imminent, as opposed to merely potential. See id

. at 239 (quotation om itted). An injury is not sufficiently particularized if, assuming it exists, it would be “shared in substantially equal measure by all or a large class of citizens.” Id

. Merely asserting every citizen ’ s “interest in proper application of the Constitution and laws” is insufficient to confer Article III standing to a plaintiff. Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife , 504 U.S. 555, 573

- 74 (1992).

1 Christie’s complaint and a document attached to his notice of appeal (which could be viewed as an attempt to amend his complaint) list a series of unrelated, current political controversies without any indication of Christie’s personal involvement, other than his status as a U.S. citizen.3

All of Christie’s allegations suffer from this lack of identifying a pa rticularized injury. He asserted that President Obama t ook actions against , and refused to act for , the best interests of the United States, and that Christie wa s thereby injured as a citizen of this country. In a document attached to his noti ce of appeal, Christie urges this Court to adjudicate his complaint be cause “Without our law and Constitution we have nothing!” Unfortunately for Christie, it is the Constitution that precludes us from adjudicating his

case. “The law of Article III standing, which is built on separation

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- powers principles, serves to prevent the judicial process from being used to usurp the powers of the political branches.” Clapper v. Amnesty Int’l USA , 133 S . Ct. 1138, 1146 (2013). There is no general, citizen standing to challenge government actions. 2 See Lujan , 504 U.S. at 573

- 74. Because we agree with the District C ourt that Christie lacked standing, we need not reach the alternative grounds for dism issal raised by the District Court. The District Court dismissed Christie’ s original complaint , but did not gi ve him an opportunity to amend because it held doing so would be futile

. W e agree with the District C ourt that amendment would have been futile. Accordingly, it was not an abuse of discretion to deny leave to amend Richard’s complaint. See In re New Jersey Title Ins. Litig. , 683 F.3d 451, 462 (3d Cir. 2012) (holding it was not an abuse of discretion to deny leave to amend where complaint was prop erly dismissed for lack of standing).

2 The District Court characterized Chri stie’s complaint as seeking a general taxpayer standing. As the District Court correctly held, merely being a taxpayer is generally insufficient to confer standing to challenge a government action. See Lujan , 504 U.S. at 574; Hein v. Freedom From Religio n Found., Inc. , 551 U.S. 587, 593 (2007).4

For the reasons given , we grant the President’s motion for summary action, and will summarily affirm the judgment of the District Court.