Topic: Newsmax
Newsmax is making a big deal about how Donald Trump "released his birth certificate exclusively to Newsmax." Just one little problem: That's not really a birth certificate.
As The Smoking Gun points out, the document he provided to Newsmax is not an official, state-authorized birth certificate -- it's a ceremonial one issued by the hospital he was (allegedly) born in, Jamaica Hospital in New York City, adding, "Official birth certificates are issued (and maintained) by the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene’s Office of Vital Records."
In other words, it's no better -- and since it's not issued by a state record-keeping agency, arguably worse -- than the birth certificate Barack Obama has released, which was issued by the Hawaii Department of Health.
The Smoking Gun adds: "On a possibly related note, Jamaica Hospital has been the recipient of significant financial largesse from the Trump family. In fact, the Queens institution includes the Trump Pavilion, a nursing and rehabilitation facility that was named for Mary Trump."
It seems that, by Trump's own standards, Trump has something to hide.
UPDATE: Trump has now ponied up an actual, official birth certificate to Newsmax. Meanwhile, Politico notes that -- as the official certificate states -- Trump's mother was born in Scotland, which would seem to run him afoul of the other birther argument used against Obama: he's not a "natural born citizen" because both of his parents were not born American.
UPDATE 2: Newsmax has also posted Trump's "certification of birth" from New York City -- the exact same form Obama has.
