April 22nd, 2011 at 7:00 am by Ted Nesi under Nesi's Notes
He didn’t put it that way, of course. But whether he realized it or not, that’s what the GOP frontrunner and “Apprentice” host asserted in an interview the other day.
In response to questions from ABC’s George Stephanopoulos, Donald Trump offered this explanation for why he’s not convinced Barack Obama was born in the United States (emphasis mine):
There’s a real question about the birth certificate. There’s a real question about the – his own – his own citizenship. … He doesn’t have a birth certificate or he hasn’t provided [one]. He’s given a certificate of live birth. It’s a much different instrument.
A Nesi’s Notes reader – who expects one of his two children will occupy the White House someday – wrote in to point out that by Trump’s reckoning, nobody born in Rhode Island can prove their eligibility for the presidency: the Rhode Island Department of Health gives everyone here a “certificate of live birth,” too.
Spokeswoman Annemarie Beardsworth confirmed that fact, and sent along an example:
Luckily for future commanders-in-chief from Woonsocket to Westerly, Stephanopoulos reports Trump is wrong – the U.S. State Department recognizes “certificates of live birth” as proof of citizenship.
March 25th, 2011 at 12:44 pm by Ted Nesi under General Talk, Nesi's Notes
After the Department of Health picked three winners from the 18 applicants who wanted to sell medical marijuana at Rhode Island’s first compassion centers, officials there refused to name the other six applicants it found to be qualified or release the scores each received, despite my colleague Walt Buteau’s request.
The department’s spokeswoman, Annemarie Beardsworth, told me its legal counsel had determined that “individual scores of the applicants are considered to be part of the deliberative process and therefore are not public record.”
“Not public record,” eh? Them’s fightin’ words. (Not that I blame Beardsworth, who’s just the messenger here.) So on Monday I filed a formal APRA request to obtain the compassion center documents. Under Section 7 of Rhode Island’s Access to Public Records Act, the department then had 10 days – until April 4 – to respond.
Happily, I received a response today. Less happily, it informed me the department is exercising its right to a 30-day extension under the same section of the law.
The reason cited was “the nature of the materials requested and the complexity of the issues that are raised relating to your request,” Adelita Orefice, a veteran bureaucrat who’s now executive director of the department’s Division of Environmental Health Services and Regulation, told me in her letter.
The new deadline is May 2. I’ll keep you posted.
More public records coverage on Nesi’s Notes:
