Claim: On whether Barack Obama was born in the United States.
Verdict: REFUTES

Retrieved passages:
title: Barack Obama citizenship conspiracy theories
text: demographic groups to doubt that Obama was born in the United States. 58% of Republicans either believed that Obama was not born in the U.S. (28%) or were not sure (30%), with 42% believing that he was. An overwhelming majority of Democrats (93%) and independents (83%) believed that he was born in the U.S. Support for the belief that Obama was born outside the U.S. was strongest in the South, where only 47% of those polled believed he was born in the U.S., compared with an average of 90% of residents of the Northeast, Midwest and West. A marked racial

title: Barack Obama citizenship conspiracy theories
text: Some said that Chester A. Arthur was born outside the United States, with his birth records later allegedly falsified to show he was born in Vermont. In May 2012, the Arizona Secretary of State, Ken Bennett, asked Hawaii to verify Obama's Hawaiian birth to ensure his eligibility to appear on the November ballot. After Bennett proved that he needed the information as part of the regular course of official business, Hawaii officially confirmed that the information in the copy of the Certificate of Live Birth for the President matches the original record in their files. Later the same month, the

title: Barack Obama citizenship conspiracy theories
text: remaining 27% were unsure. In Utah, an August 2009 poll carried out for the "Deseret News" and KSL-TV found that 67% of Utahns accepted the evidence that Obama was born in the U.S. The poll found that those who do not believe that Obama was born in the United States, or do not know, are predominantly middle-aged, lower-income Republican-leaning individuals without a college education. A Pew Research Center poll found that 80% of Americans had heard about the Obama citizenship claims by August 2009. The poll found a significant partisan divide in views of the news coverage, with 58% of

title: Barack Obama presidential eligibility litigation
text: Pennsylvania attorney Philip J. Berg, a Democrat and former deputy state attorney general, filed a complaint alleging that Obama was born in Kenya, not Hawaii, and was therefore a citizen of Kenya or possibly Indonesia, where he lived as a child. He alleged that the "Certification of Live Birth" on Obama's website is a forgery. U.S. District Judge R. Barclay Surrick dismissed the complaint in October 2008, finding that Berg lacked standing to bring the case and that his attempts to gain standing to pursue his claim were "frivolous and not worthy of discussion." Bypassing the United States Court of

title: Barack Obama citizenship conspiracy theories
text: was a Citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies at the time Obama was born, Obama was born a dual citizen and therefore was not a natural-born citizen. In August 2008, the "Rocky Mountain News" ran an online article asserting that Obama is both a U.S. and a Kenyan citizen. This turned out to be incorrect according to FactCheck.org, which noted that Obama was indeed born a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies (CUKC) under British law, by virtue of his descent from a Kenyan father at a time when Kenya was a British colony, but lost CUKC citizenship

title: Natural-born-citizen clause
text: born in 1961 in Honolulu, Hawaii (which had become a U.S. state in 1959). His mother was a U.S. citizen and his father was a British subject from British Kenya. Before and after the 2008 presidential election, arguments were made that Obama was not a natural-born citizen. On June 12, 2008, the Obama presidential campaign launched a website to counter what it described as a smear campaign by his opponents, including conspiracy theories challenging his eligibility. The most prominent issue raised against Obama was the claim made in several lawsuits that he was not actually born in Hawaii. The Supreme

title: Leo Berman
text: Anderson Cooper, Berman was unable to present any evidence that would indicate that current eligibility requirements are of insufficient strength. He was ridiculed by "The New York Times" columnist Gail Collins when he declared that U.S. President Barack H. Obama's long-form birth certificate did not prove that the president was born in the United States since "there is no plaque in the hospital where he was supposedly born". In April 2010, Berman attended a Glenn Beck-sponsored "Taking America Back" rally in which he called Obama "God's punishment on us today, but in 2012, we are going to make Obama a

title: Barack Obama citizenship conspiracy theories
text: because his mother was an American citizen, saying that Obama's mother "could have been on Mars when wee Barry emerged and he'd still be American." A contrary view is promoted by UCLA Law Professor Eugene Volokh, who has said that in the hypothetical scenario that Obama was born outside the U.S., he would be a natural-born citizen, since the then-applicable law would have required Obama's mother to have been in the U.S. at least "five years after the age of 14", but Ann Dunham was three months shy of her 19th birthday when Obama was born. An incorrect but popularly

title: Barack Obama citizenship conspiracy theories
text: and states that Obama was "born in Kenya and raised in Indonesia and Hawaii." When this was posted by Breitbart, the booklet's editor said that this incorrect information had been her mistake, not based on anything provided to her agency by Obama. On June 12, 2008, Obama's campaign responded to the rumors by posting an image of Obama's birth certificate on the ""Fight The Smears"" website. The image is a scan of a laser-printed document obtained from and certified by the Hawaii Department of Health on June 6, 2007. It is a "Certification of Live Birth", sometimes referred to as

title: Barack Obama citizenship conspiracy theories
text: "Barry" rather than "Barack"; and that Barack Obama Sr. was not his biological father, as well as the rumor that Barack Obama was not a natural-born citizen. In August 2008, Philip J. Berg, a former member of the Democratic State Committee of Pennsylvania, brought an unsuccessful lawsuit against Obama, which alleged "that Obama was born in Mombasa, Kenya." In October 2008, an NPR article referred to "Kenyan-born Sen. Barack Obama." Also that month, anonymous e-mails circulated claiming that the Associated Press (AP) had reported Obama was "Kenyan-Born". The claims were based on an AP story that had appeared five years

title: Barack Obama citizenship conspiracy theories
text: and also repeated a false claim that Hillary Clinton, his opponent in the 2016 U.S. presidential election and one of Obama's opponents in the 2008 Democratic presidential primaries, had started the controversy concerning Obama's place of birth. While those who did so were Clinton supporters, there is no evidence of Clinton or her campaign questioning Obama's birthplace. Volunteer investigators working under the direction of Maricopa County, Arizona, Sheriff Joe Arpaio have asserted that Obama's birth certificate is a computer-generated forgery. Rejecting this claim, an assistant to Hawaii's attorney general stated in July 2012 that "President Obama was born in Honolulu,

title: Barack Obama citizenship conspiracy theories
text: laws. Sociologist Matthew W. Hughey has cited many of the claims as evidence of racial "othering" of Obama against the conflation of the White Anglo-Saxon Protestant (WASP) subject as the ideal and authentic American citizen. Some opponents of Obama's presidential eligibility claim that he was born in Kenya and was therefore not born a United States citizen. Whether Obama having been born outside the U.S. would have invalidated his U.S. citizenship at birth is debated. Political commentator Andrew Malcolm, of the "Los Angeles Times", wrote that Obama would still be eligible for the presidency, regardless of where he was born,

title: Barack Obama citizenship conspiracy theories
text: the United States, and a further 11% were certain that he was not. The percentage of doubters plummeted after President Obama released the long form certificate in April 2011. A Gallup telephone poll of 1018 adults conducted in May 2011 found that 5% of respondents believed that Obama was "definitely born in another country" and 8% believed he was "probably born in another country", versus 47% believing he was "definitely" and 18% "probably" born in the US. Broken down by political affiliation, the same poll found that 23% of self-identified Republicans, 14% of independents, and 5% of Democrats thought Obama

title: African-American heritage of presidents of the United States
text: Hemings' children. The Thomas Jefferson Foundation agrees that the weight of historical evidence supports this conclusion. President Barack Obama had a Kenyan father and an American mother of mostly European ancestry. A conspiracy theory arose over whether Obama was born in the U.S., a claim generally being that he was born in Africa, which might have denied him the right to be President even if elected. Drawing on a combination of historical documents and Y-DNA analysis, Ancestry.com stated in July 2012 that it is a strong likelihood that Obama is an eleventh great-grandson of the African John Punch, who was

title: Barack Obama presidential eligibility litigation
text: Panama Canal Zone, and Calero due to allegedly still having Nicaraguan citizenship. Donofrio was not among those who claimed Obama might have been born outside Hawaii. Also, Donofrio did not challenge the fact that Obama is a U.S. citizen and instead challenged only whether Obama is a natural-born citizen. The case was referred to the Supreme Court by Justice Clarence Thomas. When the case reached the United States Supreme Court on December 8, 2008, the Court declined without comment to hear it. On October 31, 2008, Greenwich resident and health food store owner Cort Wrotnowski filed a suit in the

title: Barack Obama citizenship conspiracy theories
text: "Well, love and a birth certificate." At the 2011 Gridiron Dinner, Obama referred to Bruce Springsteen's song, "Born in the U.S.A.", and commented, "Some things just bear repeating." On March 17, 2011 (Saint Patrick's Day), Obama said, "Now, speaking of ancestry, there has been some controversy about my own background. Two years into my presidency, some are still bent on peddling rumors about my origins. So today, I want to put all those rumors to rest. It is true my great-great-great-grandfather really was from Ireland. It's true. Moneygall, to be precise. I can't believe I have to keep pointing this

title: Barack Obama citizenship conspiracy theories
text: "even though all the information out there says he was born at Kapiolani Hospital", citing federal privacy laws. In 1961, birth notices for Barack Obama were published in both the "Honolulu Advertiser" and the "Honolulu Star-Bulletin" on August 13 and 14, 1961, respectively, listing the home address of Obama's parents as 6085 Kalanianaole Highway in Honolulu. On November 9, 2008, in response to the persistent rumors, the "Advertiser" posted on its web site a screenshot of the announcement taken from its microfilmed archives. Such notices were sent to newspapers routinely by the Hawaii Department of Health. In an editorial published

title: Orly Taitz
text: said that she lost relatives in the Holocaust and that her grandmother witnessed the Kishinev pogrom. Taitz alleges that President Obama is not a natural-born citizen of the United States and is therefore ineligible to serve as President. She claims he was born in Kenya and that he falsified his Selective Service papers and his application to the Illinois bar. "I believe [Obama] is the most dangerous thing one can imagine, in that he represents radical communism and radical Islam: He was born and raised in radical Islam, all of his associations are with radical Islam, and he was groomed

title: Barack Obama citizenship conspiracy theories
text: Republicans believed that Obama had been born outside the United States. As a result of the widespread publicity given to the citizenship controversy, 60% of respondents in an Ohio State University survey carried out in November 2008 had heard of the issue. However, only 10% believed the claims that Obama was not a citizen. An opinion poll carried out for Daily Kos by Research 2000 in July 2009 found that 77% of Americans believed that Obama was born in the U.S., while 11% didn't, and 12% were unsure. However, Republicans and Southerners were far more likely than other political or

title: Barack Obama citizenship conspiracy theories
text: Democrats saying that the allegations had received too much attention from the media. Republicans were more inclined to say that the allegations had received too little attention, with 39% expressing this view against only 26% saying that the controversy had received too much attention. In a Harris Poll online survey of 2,320 adults conducted in March 2010, 25% of the respondents said they believed that Obama was "not born in the United States and so is not eligible to be president." In a July 2010 CNN poll of adult Americans, 16% said they had doubts that Obama was born in