川普改弦易轍，承認奧巴馬生於美國

U.S. Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump - or, at least his campaign - admitted Thursday he believed President Barack Obama was actually born in the United States, after years of questioning the president's citizenship.

The Trump campaign, in a statement, credited Trump with forcing Obama to release his birth certificate and bringing closure to an issue he helped bring into the spotlight over the course of Obama's presidency.

“Inarguably, Donald J. Trump is a closer,” spokesman Jason Miller said. “Having successfully obtained President Obama's birth certificate when others could not, Mr. Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States.”

Earlier in the day Thursday, Hillary Clinton, at her first campaign event since she was diagnosed with pneumonia and forced to leave a September 11 memorial event Sunday with health issues, tore into Trump for his support of the so-called “birther movement.” She referenced a Washington Post story published Thursday in which Trump refused to say whether he believes Obama was born in America, and said he does not talk about the issue anymore.

Clinton urged voters to "conclusively" stop Trump, and what she calls his bigotry, in the November election.

While Trump has repeatedly questioned the validity of Obama's presidency over the past eight years and fed into conspiracy theories over the authenticity of his birth certificate, Miller blamed Clinton for raising the issue in the first place.

"Hillary Clinton's campaign first raised this issue to smear then-candidate Barack Obama in her very nasty, failed 2008 campaign for president. This type of vicious and conniving behavior is straight from the Clinton playbook. As usual, however, Hillary Clinton was too weak to get an answer."

The Trump statement pointed to a 2007 Clinton campaign memo in which chief strategist Mark Penn said Obama had a “lack of American roots” and not “fundamentally American in his thinking and values” as proof of Clinton's role in the birther movement.

Clinton responded to Trump on Twitter by saying, “President Obama's successor cannot and will not be the man who led the racist birther movement. Period.”

Clinton has, in the past, denied claims that her campaign started the rumors about Obama's birthplace.共和黨總統候選人川普，至少是他的競選團隊，星期四承認，他認爲奧巴馬總統的確生於美國。多年來，他一直質疑奧巴馬的國籍。

川普的競選團隊在一份聲明中把奧巴馬被迫公開其出生證一事歸功於川普，因爲他促使這個問題在奧巴馬任內成爲公衆關注的焦點並最終得到解決。

川普競選團隊發言人米勒說：“毋庸置疑，川普使這個問題得到解決。”“在別人辦不到的情況下，他成功地得到了奧巴馬總統的出生證明，川普先生認爲奧巴馬的確生於美國。”

星期四稍早，希拉里·克林頓對川普支持所謂的“出生地運動”進行猛烈抨擊。這是希拉里被診斷患有肺炎後首次出現在競選活動中。上週日，她因健康問題被迫離開“九一一”周年紀念活動。克林頓引用華盛頓郵報星期四發表的一篇文章。文章稱川普拒絕說明他是否認爲奧巴馬生於美國，並說他不再談論這個問題。

克林頓敦促選民在11月的大選中“徹底”制止川普以及她所說的川普的偏執行爲。

雖然川普在過去八年一再質疑奧巴馬總統職位的合法性，並且爲質疑其出生證真僞的陰謀論推波助瀾，但是米勒指責克林頓纔是這個問題的始作俑者。

米勒說：“克林頓2008年競選總統時，她的競選團隊爲了抹黑當時的候選人奧巴馬首先提出了出生證的問題，克林頓低劣的競選最後以失敗告終。這種惡毒和狡詐的行爲是克林頓管用的伎倆，但是同往常一樣，由於她能力太差，這件事無疾而終。”

川普團隊的聲明直指2007年克林頓競選團隊的一份備忘錄，以此證明克林頓在“出生地運動”中所發揮的作用。當時希拉里的首席策劃人佩恩在備忘錄中說，奧巴馬“缺乏美國根基”，而且“他的思想和價值觀基本上與美國格格不入”。

克林頓在推特上回應川普說：“奧巴馬總統的繼任者不可能，也不會是領導種族主義的“出生地運動”的人。”

克林頓過去就一直表示，有關她的競選團隊製造了奧巴馬出生地問題一說是謠言。