Christie: NJ and NY incidents ‘are terrorism,’ no connection ‘at this time’

Chris Christie argued on Sunday that Donald Trump did not frequently question for years the validity of President Barack Obama’s USA birthplace, though Trump pedaled the discredited conspiracy theory claiming Obama was not born in Hawaii since Obama’s first term. “I’ve said it’s a done issue for a long time, and Donald Trump has said it’s a done issue now”, Christie said.

During the interview, Christie told host Chris Wallace, “it was a contentious issue and an issue that the Clinton campaign in 2008 has admitted was an issue that Mrs. Clinton injected into her campaign in 2008 in a very quiet, but direct way against then-Senator Obama”.

“Given the history of the Obama administration and IRS to use the IRS as a weapon against conservative groups and candidates, I don’t blame the accountants for saying better safe than sorry”, he said, in reference to the agency’s tea party targeting scandal.

“The birther issue is a done issue”.

Trump’s running mate, Indiana Gov. Mike Pence, stuck to a similar line in an interview with ABC’s Martha Raddatz on “This Week”. He later added that the American people are not focused on birtherism.

He also declared birtherism “over” and denied Trump has any responsibility it. Pence said that there are reporters who trace the “birther movement all the way back to Hillary Clinton’s campaign in 2008” and that “the facts speak for themselves”, although he wouldn’t list any such facts.

When she was asked why Trump spent five years pushing this conspiracy theory about the president, Conway responded, “Well, you’re going to have to ask him”.

“And he either believed what he said for five years, which showed that he’s either incredibly gullible or conspiratorial, or he didn’t believe it, in which case he was just trying to prey upon people’s darkest emotion”, he said. Christie on Sunday repeated the clearly debunked claims that Trump dropped the issue in 2011. In fact, Solis Doyle told CNN on Friday no one from the Clinton campaign, including Hillary herself, started the birther campaign against Obama and that an Iowa volunteer coordinator who had forwarded a conspiracy email had been immediately fired. “Why did he do that?”

CHRISTIE: Oh, of course there are, you know, but, again, I think one of the things – and this comes from my background as a prosecutor for seven years, Jake – you don’t want to jump to conclusions.

It’s hard to say exactly what Christie’s definition of “regular basis” is, but it’s gonna be hard to explain away these tweets, which you’ll notice were all sent after 2011. And, again, he put everything out on the table on Friday.