Reporters Miss Point of Birth Certificate Probe

PURPOSELY OR NOT?

by Sharon Rondeau

(Jan. 12, 2018) — A January 11, 2018 article published in the International Business Times (IBT) erroneously reports that former Maricopa County, AZ Sheriff Joseph Arpaio “said he had proof that Obama was not born in Hawaii, as stated by the former president’s birth certificate.”

However, Arpaio’s 5+-year investigation, which he assigned to his “Cold Case Posse” in August 2011, never centered on Barack Hussein Obama’s birthplace, as Arpaio has himself said.  Rather, it found that the long-form birth certificate image posted at whitehouse.gov in April 2011 is a “computer-generated forgery.”

Since declaring those conclusions in early 2012, the media has refused to take the matter seriously.

Without explaining that Arpaio had commissioned an investigation into the birth certificate image, IBT wrote, “Arpaio seems to be latching onto the conspiracy that propelled President Donald Trump into national politics in 2011 a day after he announced he was running for the Senate seat currently occupied by Sen. Jeff Flake, who is retiring from Congress at the end of his term.”

The image was uploaded after then-businessman Donald Trump generated considerable public pressure for the White House to prove that Obama was born in the United States and eligible for the presidency as a “natural born Citizen.”

“In an interview with CNN on Wednesday, Arpaio, who recently announced his [sic] running for a Senate seat in Arizona, said he had proof that Obama was not born in Hawaii, as stated by the former president’s birth certificate,” IBT reported of the exchange between host Chris Cuomo and the former Maricopa County, AZ lawman.

A flurry of mainstream news reports has resulted from Arpaio’s Tuesday announcement that he is running for the U.S. Senate to replace the retiring junior senator from Arizona, Jeff Flake. Most of the reportage has inaccurately quoted Arpaio about the birth certificate probe, which was carried out by former New Jersey detective Mike Zullo as lead investigator of Arpaio’s “Cold Case Posse.”

When Cuomo raised Arpaio’s alleged “birtherism,” Arpaio responded that the investigation gathered “evidence” showing that the long-form birth certificate is fraudulent.  Cuomo then argued that “either the man was born in this country or he wasn’t.  Fortunately, we know the answer,” an apparent dodge of the question of who, and why, a fraudulent image was presented to the American people instead of a scan of a genuine birth certificate of a then-sitting president.

Arpaio has stated repeatedly that he does not “care where he’s [Obama] from.” On Wednesday, he told Cuomo, “No doubt about it, we have the evidence, I’m not going to go into all the details, yeah, it’s a phony document.”

“A huge proponent of Trump’s immigration policies, Arpaio now appears to be taking up the cause to unmask the conspiracy of Obama’s birth’ while he embarks on a campaign for the Arizona Senate seat,” IBT additionally falsely reported.

Since Tuesday, The Post & Email has pointed out significant media inaccuracies, misleading statements and reporters’ stubborn insistence that Obama was “born in Hawaii” while ostensibly covering Arpaio’s nascent campaign and his characterization of the birth certificate investigation.