Barack Obama publishes his birth certificate to prove he’s American

His hand was forced by the billionaire and potential presidential candidate Donald Trump.

He revived gossip about Obama’s citizenship – which, had it been true, would have made him ineligible for the White House.

Obama has already had to produce a “certificate of live birth” – the standard official document – when he was first challenged during the election campaign in 2008.

But hardcore Republicans always claimed it was fake and the flames were fanned by Trump.

So Obama, 49, finally instructed his lawyers to obtain the original, long-form birth certificate from a health department vault in Hawaii.

Yesterday aides posted it on the internet and sent copies to the media. A clearly irritated Obama added: “We do not have time for this kind of silliness, we’ve got better stuff to do.”

He said he was puzzled by how the issue had been kept going for more than two years.

Doubters had formed a groundswell of opinion known as the “Birther” movement. Some claimed the original certificate could show that Obama was not born in the US and that he was a Muslim.

The birth certificate revealed yesterday for the first time stated clearly that Barack Hussein Obama was born on August 4 1961 at a maternity hospital in Honolulu, Hawaii, at 7.24pm, to his white mother from Kansas and his namesake black father from Kenya.

There was no mention of religion, but Obama has repeatedly insisted he is Christian. Asked for his response yesterday property tycoon Mr Trump said: “I would like to see it, I hope it’s true, I hope it checks out beautifully.”

He added that he could not announce his official presidential candidacy until his reality TV show Celebrity Apprentice reaches its finale on May 22.

Obama is still ahead in the polls, however, with 64 per cent of Americans saying they definitely would not vote for Trump in 2012.