Donald Trump’s birther backers have a lot to absorb.
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Speaking to mostly students at George Mason University in Fairfax, she repeatedly jabbed Republican candidate Donald Trump without mentioning him by name, declaring that being president “isn’t anything like reality TV”. We are reminded of his central role in the birtherism conspiracy and the enthusiasm of his fans for it.
They reportedly debated how much or how little detail Trump should have given in his announcement.
Where do they go now?
Clinton condemned Trump’s actions and said on Twitter that President Obama’s successor will not be the man who led the racist birther movement.
In 2011, Trump began fanning the birther conspiracy flames on television, saying this to Fox News’ Bill O’Reilly: “People have birth certificates”. An NBC/Survey Monkey poll this year showed that 41 percent surveyed disagreed with the statement, “Barack Obama was born in the United States”.
Over the years, that’s never been enough for Trump.
In fact, she’s leaning toward Libertarian presidential candidate Gary Johnson but could be swayed to vote for Clinton.
Political pundits listed one obvious reason why Clinton was so eager to engage on this issue: if minority voters show up to vote like they did for Obama, with a record 66 per cent turnout the last time, she nearly certainly becomes president. “You know what I mean”, Trump said.
In Washington, Trump earlier declared, “President Barack Obama was born in the United States”. Meanwhile, Trump Jr. had his hands full Friday walking back his Holocaust joke.
But he also stepped up attacks against his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton, accusing her of initiating the doubts about Obama and later raising the spectre of violence against her again.
Trump later disputed that criticism, saying everyone in his audience knew he was referring to the power of voters and “there can be no other interpretation”.
Still, Trump may not have an enormous downside to his tardy admission.
Since 2008, President Obama’s birthplace has been a subject of speculations. “Period”, Trump said at a campaign event in a ballroom in his new hotel in Washington.
Obama was born in Hawaii in 1961, just two years after the island in the Pacific Ocean became a US state.
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“This is an attempt, I think, to soften him somewhat, to make him more acceptable to people who worry about his temperament and fitness for the office”, KCCI political analyst Dennis Goldford said. Mothers of the Movement came out in support of Clinton and her call for gun control at the Democratic National Convention. “That is the kind of President they will be”. The CBC called on Trump to issue Obama an apology. “Well, I’m not that shocked actually – it’s fairly typical”, he said shortly before a meeting. “My hope would be the presidential election reflects more serious issues than that”. “There was a volunteer coordinator, I believe in late 2007, I think in December”.
