NEW YORK (AP) – Donald Trump says he finally admitted President Barack Obama was born in the United States because he wanted to “get on with the campaign.”
In a brief interview with an Ohio television station Wednesday, Trump was asked why, after years as the chief proponent of the falsehood that the president was born outside the country, he decided to announce Friday that was no longer the case.
What had changed his mind?
“Well, I just wanted to get on with, you know, we want to get on with the campaign,” the GOP nominee responded.
“And a lot of people were asking me questions. And you know, we want to talk about jobs, we want to talk about the military,” he added. “We want to talk about ISIS and how to get rid of ISIS. We want to really talk about bringing jobs back to this area because you’ve been decimated. So we really want to get just back onto the subject of jobs, military, taking care of our vets, et cetera.”