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And when Obama released the document, he did it to rebuke Trump - first calling him a "carnival barker" from the White House podium, then making him the object of ridicule at the White House Correspondents' Dinner. He took the conspiracy theory mainstream before Obama released his birth certificate, 45 percent of Republicans believed he was born elsewhere. He sent investigators to Hawaii to look into Obama's birth certificate. Trump embraced birtherism wholeheartedly. Considering that history also make the unprecedented success of his campaign seem, in retrospect, a little less shocking. But Trump's history as a birther didn't just make him the butt of jokes after Obama released his real birth certificate.
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The jokes are still pretty good, even if they seem a little more unsettling these days. "It might be devoted to the moment when new life was fed into an old ideology, when Trump’s ambitions suddenly turned over to the potent politics of shame and vengeance." Trump's past as a birther explains his entire campaign "Some day someone may well write a kind of micro-history of that night, as historians now are wont to do, as a pivot in American life," Adam Gopnik wrote in the New Yorker in 2015. The New York Times's Maggie Haberman and Alexander Burns wrote that the mockery of Trump "accelerated his ferocious efforts to gain stature within the political world." It turned out to be a pivotal night, and not just because the raid that killed Osama bin Laden was going on at the same time. "Unless the Blacks are a family of white people, I bet he's mistaken."
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Mr Trump chuckled at some of the earlier jokes, but was clearly less amused as comedian Seth Meyers picked up where the President left off.Trump said "he's got a great relationship with 'the blacks,'" Meyers said in one of his best lines, referencing phrasing Trump still uses.
Obama mocks donald trump tv#
"No one is prouder to put this birth certificate matter to rest than 'the Donald'," Mr Obama said, referring to Mr Trump's claims the same day that he was responsible for solving the issue.įor Mr Trump's decision to fire actor Busey instead of rock singer Meat Loaf from his TV show earlier this month, Mr Obama quipped: "These are the types of decisions that would keep me up at night.
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Mr Obama said Mr Trump has shown the acumen of a future president, from firing actor Gary Busey on a recent episode of Celebrity Apprentice to focusing so much time on conspiracy theories about the President's birthplace.Īfter a week when Mr Obama released his Hawaii birth certificate, he said Mr Trump could now focus on the serious issues, from whether the moon landing actually happened to "where are Biggie and Tupac?" With Mr Trump in attendance, Mr Obama used the White House Correspondents' Association annual dinner to mock the reality TV star's presidential ambitions. President Barack Obama has exercised his revenge after weeks of attacks from his would-be Republican challenger Donald Trump, joking that the billionaire businessman could bring change to the White House, transforming it from a stately mansion into a tacky casino with a whirlpool in the garden.
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