Barack Obama was born in Honolulu in 1961. Hawaii issued his short-form certificate in 2008 and, at his request, released the long-form version on 27 April 2011, saying “We do not have time for this kind of silliness.” [1]

In 2009, Hawaii’s health director, Dr. Chiyome Fukino, said she had “seen the original vital records” and that they verified Obama “was born in Hawai’i and is a natural-born American citizen.” Birth announcements based on state records ran in Honolulu newspapers in 1961. [2]

Trump did not start the rumor, but from April 2011, as he weighed a presidential run, he became its most prominent promoter. He said the 2008 certificate was “not a birth certificate”; FactCheck.org noted that the State Department treats that document as a birth certificate for passports. [2]

The long form did not end it for him. In August 2012 he tweeted that “an ‘extremely credible source’ has called my office and told me that Barack Obama’s birth certificate is a fraud.” In 2014 he tweeted that he got Obama “to release his birth certificate, or whatever that was!” [2]

On 16 September 2016 he said: “President Barack Obama was born in the United States. Period.” In the same statement he said Hillary Clinton’s 2008 campaign started the controversy and that he “finished it.” FactCheck.org found no evidence that Clinton or her campaign started or spread it, though some of her supporters did in 2008. A 2007 memo from a Clinton strategist discussed Obama’s “lack of American roots” but did not question his birthplace. [2]