Seth Meyers slams Donald Trump for birtherism
One of Donald Trump’s most brazen moves came on Friday, when the Republican presidential candidate declared at a press conference that his opponent, Hillary Clinton, was the true originator of the “birtherism” movement that claims President Barack Obama was not born in the U.S.
Trump has long been one of the primary proponents of birtherism, even after President Obama released his long-form birth certificate in 2011. In fact, discussing birtherism is how Trump first transitioned to political figure in the first place. During his A Closer Look segment Monday night, Seth Meyers took Trump to task for all of this.
“‘Obama was born in the United States, period’? F— you, exclamation point!” Meyers said. “You don’t get to peddle racist rhetoric for five years and decide when it’s over. We decide when it’s over. And it’s certainly not over after a 30-second statement in the middle of a hotel commercial. ‘Also, the Travelocity gnome said all Mexicans aren’t rapists, so that’s over now too.’ Saying Obama wasn’t born in the U.S. is your No. 1 hit. Saying you got it from Hillary would be like Bruce Springsteen saying he only wrote ‘Born to Run’ because he heard Bon Jovi say it once.”
Trump and his campaign surrogates like Chris Christie and Kellyanne Conway went on cable news over the weekend, trying to declare that Trump stopped promoting birtherism conspiracies after Obama’s certificate release in 2011, but as Meyers demonstrated, that simply isn’t true. Trump continued to cast aspersions on Obama’s legacy as recently as last year.
“By the way, I’m not sure the guy who holds fake press conferences, has a fake university, has a fake foundation, fake hair, and a fake tan should be the one in charge of deciding what’s real,” Meyers said.
Meyers continued to use Trump’s own tweets and media clips to disprove his latest birtherism claims, but eventually the host cut right down to his main point.
“The bottom line is this: Trump built his career on a racist lie, because he’s a racist and a liar,” Meyers said.
Watch the clip below.
