Trump: Clinton ‘started the birther movement’
Donald Trump on Wednesday bashed Hillary Clinton as the founder of “the birther movement,” resurfacing a claim the Democratic presidential front-runner has long denied.
When asked by CNN’s Wolf Blitzer about Clinton’s recent criticism of his dogged pursuit of President Obama’s birth certificate, Trump struck back by laying the issue at her feet.
{mosads}”You know who started the birther movement? Do you know who questioned his birth certificate, one of the first?” Trump asked.
“Hillary Clinton, she’s the one who started it. She started it years before it was brought up by me.”
Trump said he no longer talks about the issue because it always breeds controversy but promised to “raise it against” Clinton in a general election.
Trump repeatedly questioned Obama’s country of birth ahead of his 2012 reelection, which ultimately led to the president releasing his long-form birth certificate from Hawaii. Clinton has attacked Trump on the issue ahead of their likely general election matchup.
Multiple fact-checking websites have ruled the claim that Clinton started the birther controversy as false. And Blitzer ended the segment by telling the audience that there’s no evidence that Clinton herself ever questioned Obama’s birth certificate.
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