Donald Trump still refuses to say whether President Barack Obama was born in the United States — but his campaign said Thursday that the Republican nominee now believes that the Democrat was born in the U.S.
"Having successfully obtained President Obama’s birth certificate when others could not, Mr. Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States," Trump campaign spokesman Jason Miller said in a statement.
Obama released his full Hawaii birth certificate in April 2011, a month after Trump himself raised the birther issue for the first time by telling "Good Morning America" that he was a "little" skeptical of Obama's citizenship.
"Hillary Clinton’s campaign first raised this issue to smear then-candidate Barack Obama in her very nasty, failed 2008 campaign for president," Miller said in the statement late Thursday. "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. Even the MSNBC show 'Morning Joe' admits that it was Clinton's henchmen who first raised this issue, not Donald J. Trump."
Miller was referring to comments made by "Morning Joe" co-host Joe Scarborough on a September 2015 program. He had slammed Clinton for criticizing Donald Trump when he refused to silence a supporter who commented on Obama's religion.
Miller's statement continued: "In 2011, Mr. Trump was finally able to bring this ugly incident to its conclusion by successfully compelling President Obama to release his birth certificate.
"Mr. Trump did a great service to the president and the country by bringing closure to the issue that Hillary Clinton and her team first raised," he added. "Inarguably, Donald J. Trump is a closer.
"Mr. Trump is now totally focused on bringing jobs back to America, defeating radical Islamic terrorism, taking care of our veterans, introducing school choice opportunities and rebuilding and making our inner cities safe again."
In an interview with The Washington Post conducted late Wednesday aboard his private plane in Ohio, Trump refused to say whether he believed Obama, 55, was born in this country.
"I'll answer that question at the right time," he said. "I just don’t want to answer it yet."
The Post then asked whether campaign manager Kellyanne Conway was accurate when she said last week that Trump now believed that Obama was born in the United States, he responded: "It's okay.
"She’s allowed to speak what she thinks. I want to focus on jobs," the Republican nominee added. "I want to focus on other things.
"I don’t talk about it anymore," he later added. "The reason I don't is because then everyone is going to be talking about it as opposed to jobs, the military, the vets, security."
In 2012, Trump offered to donate $5 million to the charity of President Obama's choice if he released his college and passport applications.
Trump had since remained silent on the issue until an interview with Wolf Blitzer on CNN in January. Trump began his White House run in June 2015.
"Who knows about Obama?" he asked Blitzer in the Jan. 6 session. "Who knows, who knows? Who cares right now?
"I have my own theory on Obama," Trump continued. "Someday, I will write a book.
"I will do another book — and it will do very successfully."
Before Miller's statement was released, Clinton herself ripped Trump for the Post comments on the birther issue.
"He did it again," she told the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute at its gala dinner in Washington. "He was asked one more time, where was president Obama born?
"He still wouldn't say Hawaii. He still wouldn't say America.
"This man wants to be our next president?" Clinton asked. "When will he stop this ugliness, this bigotry?
"He's tried to reset himself and his campaign many times. This is the best he can do. This is who he is."
Clinton, who spoke after President Obama addressed the event, returned to the campaign trail Thursday after being out for three days to battle pneumonia.
She spoke earlier in Greensboro, N.C. — afterward holding her first news conference with reporters in more than nine months.
In his Post interview, Trump also defended his wife, Melania, against news reports questioning whether she had emigrated legally from Slovenia and beat back notions that he had "embraced" Russian President Vladimir Putin despite recent comments praising him.
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