Birther Nation: Alive and Well
Whatever Trump said yesterday, his supporters know he’s privately agreed with them all along.
MIAMI—Many of Donald Trump’s supporters at his raucous rally here Friday night still believe President Obama was born in Kenya. “I know it in my heart,” said Pedro Almeyda, an elevator engineer. Others still aren’t sure. “He doesn’t show love for this country, but who knows?” asked Carmen Suarez, a retired nurse
.. Clinton has not run ads or focused her speeches on his flip-flops, in part because she fears voters will assume he really believes the position they agree with.
.. Birthers like Fermin Vazquez, a disabled veteran from nearby Coral Gables, suggested that Trump is now fibbing to tamp down the media frenzy, even though he secretly believes Obama is a foreigner. “He knows the truth, but he’s got to follow the rules to get elected,” Vazquez said.
.. Marlon Montero, a student and Trump volunteer, never believed the birther falsehoods, and he’s convinced Trump never believed them either. He suggested the innuendo that worked in the Republican primary was no longer working, so Trump is wisely dropping it. “When you’re running for president, you need media attention, and Mr. Trump got it when he needed it,” Montero said. “He knows what he’s doing.”
.. Both birthers (who were often well-versed in Internet conspiracy theories about Obama’s Kenyan half-brother) and non-birthers (who tended to grin and roll their eyes about those theories) agreed that Democrats nervous about Clinton’s recent poll numbers concocted the latest media storm over the president’s roots. And neither group seemed to be persuaded or bothered by Trump’s eleventh-hour conversion.
.. “Obama’s a communist. His mother and father were communists. For sure he was born in Kenya,” Almeyda said. “I guess Trump had to say he wasn’t, for politics. But remember, it was Trump who asked for Obama’s birth certificate. He knows.”
.. Millie Cagol, a housewife in Coral Gables, said Trump is a provocateur, not a racist, describing the initial birth certificate demand as a combination of savvy politics and due diligence. Now that the political winds have shifted, and the due diligence is long done, Cagol figures Trump is free to tell the truth. “He just did it to get attention and stir people up. And I think he likes to see things on paper,” Cagol said. “Anyway, he’s moving on.”
..“I wasn’t there when he was born,” Lazano said. “But I’ll tell you this: I know for a fact that he’s a Muslim.”