Examining James Asher’s Claim that Blumenthal Pushed Birtherism

Journalists need to make sure that they verify claims and examine evidence before they repeat unfounded claims.

Media sources were abuzz today reporting on Donald Trump’s tepid acknowledgement of Obama’s US birthplace, notably lacking any apology or explanation of why he spread conspiracy mumblings all the way into 2016. In typical Trump fashion, he instead decided to pin the blame on Hillary Clinton for starting the conspiracy back in 2008.

Both Clinton’s campaign and fact-checkers were quick to point out that this was a lie.

However, a new claim emerged within a few hours by James Asher, a former McClatchy news service Washington bureau chief. Asher claims that long-time Clinton ally Sid Blumenthal told him in 2008 to investigate Obama’s birth — which he implied was in Kenya. Asher allegedly dispatched an investigator to Kenya to examine the claims, of which they found no proof.

This is clearly a “whoa if true” moment — except Asher doesn’t really provide any evidence that it is true, and Blumenthal quickly denied the accusation. That didn’t stop some major conservatives from aggressively spreading this claim as if it was verified fact. I wrestled with linking specific conservatives doing this — but I don’t want to call anyone specific out. Many people gleefully spreading this claim as fact are people that I deeply respect and admire. But they’re wrong. The buzz was so loud, that major reporters picked up on this story, and McClatchy (Asher’s prior employer) wrote an article about it.

The reality is this — conservatives (myself included) don’t like Sid Blumenthal for many legitimate reasons. However, it is wholly inappropriate to claim that Blumenthal did this without evidence of it. This is a gigantic claim that currently has zero evidence behind it (and very few people seem to be pointing out that fact). Forgoing the usual required steps (verifying claims, examining evidence) because they target someone we despise is the opposite of good journalism and the opposite of good commentary. We owe it to readers to present facts in an objective manner and to pursue the strongest arguments possible. This hasn’t happened here.

Lacking Evidence

Here’s what we’re lacking from Asher (that could be reasonably asked of him):

• detailed notes of his meeting with Blumenthal
• multiple, unbiased reporters confirming that he met with Blumenthal in 2008, and that the subject of the meeting was birtherism
• evidence that he sent an investigator to Kenya to pursue these claims
• the investigator who traveled to Kenya confirming the investigation, the reason for the investigation, and the source

Asher has provided none of this, nor has he hinted at being able to provide any of this. Instead, the only thing he has offered is Blumenthal’s business card.

This is not evidence, and someone with a background like Asher knows this. He should also know that if he really wanted to prove this, he would be able to provide the evidence listed above. Instead his evidence is possession of a business card? This is absurd.

Asher is right about one thing — it’s Sid’s word against his. And that’s all it is. No evidence, no corroboration, nothing. Normally objective people would call this hearsay and disregard it as unverified. Instead it’s being passed around by respected journalists and commentators without any skepticism. Jeffrey Lord (a Trump surrogate) repeated it on CNN and claimed this is a “massive fraud”.

Unanswered Questions

There remain valid questions regarding Asher’s actions here that deserve to be investigated:

• Why has Asher waited so long to tell this story?
• Is Asher a reliable source that is reasonably unbiased?

Why has Asher waited so long to tell this story?

Asher first tweets about Blumenthal spreading this on March 13th of this year:

He’s repeated the claim several times after March, but I can’t find a single instance of Asher repeating this claim in the eight-year gap between 2008 and March 2016.

Why? Why wouldn’t he bring up this claim in 2011, when birtherism was in the news from Trump’s crusade and Obama releasing his birth certificate? Why wouldn’t he bring this up during the 2012 election, when the whole GOP was being attacked for birtherism? Why wouldn’t he bring this up in 2015, when Clinton was fighting against Sanders during the primary? Why stay silent until eight years later?

These are all legitimate questions that should be raised, and that Asher has an obligation to answer. The timeline doesn’t hold up to scrutiny.

Is Asher a reliable source that is reasonably unbiased?

One potential aspect that may make Asher’s claim more believable is if he presents himself as an unbiased commentator. In other words, does he seem to have a neutral point of view regarding this election?

A quick twitter glance shows this is absolutely not the case. In fact, a noticeably large portion of Asher’s tweets are attacking Hillary Clinton. Other favorite topics include retweeting Wikileaks, and stories about Manning, Snowden, and Assange — which all consider Clinton to be public enemy number one. This hardly feels like the claim of an unbiased reporter.

Here’s a small sampling of tweets from Asher:

Asher clearly isn’t unbiased — he has a clear issue with Hillary Clinton. Now, that doesn’t mean that Asher can’t be telling the truth — he absolutely can be. But it does mean that we should take extra caution in verifying his claims (which again, we have not done). Asher comes off as a Sanders supporter with a strong dislike of Clinton — but then why didn’t Asher bring up these claims during the primaries when this could have hurt Hillary and benefited Bernie?

These are all reasonable questions that need to be answered before media outlets treat this claim as legitimate. Unfortunately, little skepticism has been applied to Asher or this gargantuan claim. Normally objective conservative journalists and commentators have gleefully forgone required obligations of basic fact-checking in order to spread this story. Let’s make sure it gets done.

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