Hawaii Officially Passes Anti-Birther Law, Legally Shuns Birth Certificate Requests

Aloha "Birthers": Hawaii Law Allows State To Ignore demands for Obama's Birth Certificate


Hawaii to Birthers: Thanks for writing, now aloha!

The island state's Republican Gov. Linda Lingle signed into law on Wednesday a bill that would allow Hawaii to ignore repeated requests for President Obama's birth certificate.

Health Department officials say they still get 10 to 20 e-mails each week requesting verification that Obama was in fact born in Hawaii, which prompted the law.

Speculation about the President's birthplace has continued on the Internet for nearly two years, despite evidence that he was born in the nation's 50th state in 1961.

"I had my health director, who is a physician by background, go personally view the birth certificate in the birth records of the Department of Health," Lingle said during a recent interview on WABC Radio with Rabbi Shmuley Boteach.

"The President was, in fact, born at Kapi'olani Hospital in Honolulu, Hawaii," she said. "And that's just a fact."

"Birthers" have come under fire repeatedly by the likes of Fox News' Bill O'Reilly, Ann Coulter, and CNN's Anderson Cooper, all of whom have dismissed the elaborate claims by conspiracy theorists who believe Obama is not a United States citizen and cannot legally be President.

Followers of the largely discredited conspiracy theory generally argue he was actually born in Kenya. A birth certificate that surfaced online showing he was born in Africa was later proven to be false. A "news story" about Obama spending millions to hide his birth certificate was also later shown to be fake.

"Birthers," however, have remained undeterred, demanding that Obama produce his original birth certificate.

The poster boy for the "birther movement," Lt. Col. Terry Lakin, still faces a court martial for refusing to deploy to Afghanistan unless Obama shows his birth certificate.

"I believe we need truth on this matter," Lakin said on CNN's Anderson Cooper 360.

In 2008, Obama's campaign posted online an official Hawaiian certification of live birth, which is considered legally the same as a birth certificate (which was also photographed and examined by factcheck.org) has failed to quiet "birthers."

A planned march on Washington, D.C. by the movement's supporters was planned for later this month, but has since been postponed until August or September.


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Sources: BBC, LA Times, MSNBC, NY Daily News, The Grio, Youtube, Google Maps