Former President Barack Obama cracked a joke about not being able to “vouch” for his own Hawaiian birth in the Aloha State on Sunday.
The light-hearted moment came near the start of a private event hosted by his nonprofit organization, the Obama Foundation, at the East-West Center in Honolulu.
“There are rumors that I was born about a mile from here. I have a birth certificate,” Obama said as people in the audience laughed. “I cannot vouch for the fact that I was born here because I was very small at the time. But people who were there say it’s true.”
The joke references a tenet of the so-called “birther” movement, which during his presidency questioned Obama’s U.S. citizenship and for years had an advocate in President Trump. However, Trump admitted during the presidential campaign that Obama was born in the U.S.
Obama, who released copies of a short-form “certification of live birth” in 2008 and a long-form birth certificate in 2011 in an effort to fight the rumors, has since cracked a number of jokes about the “birther” movement over the years.
For instance, he joked in 2017 at the inaugural Obama Foundation Summit in Chicago that he was born in Kenya — which was one of the “birther” conspiracy theories. “The reason I’m so excited to see you all here today in part is because this is were I started,” said Obama, who got his start as a community organizer in Chicago. “Now this isn’t where I was born. I was born in Kenya. That’s a joke,” he added.
At the Honolulu event, Obama met young leaders from the Asia-Pacific region. During his 21-minute speech he made a reference to the current state of politics, saying the U.S. has “a deficit of leadership, and we need new blood.”
