Trump Keeps Suggesting People Who Aren’t White Aren’t Eligible To Be President

Donald Trump is fueling a lie on social media that Nikki Haley isn’t eligible to be president because she’s not a natural-born U.S. citizen ― the same lie he spread about former President Barack Obama, Vice President Kamala Harris and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas.).

It’s almost as if there is something ― something! ― about all of these people who happen to be not white and who happen to have immigrant parents that makes Trump wonder if they are real Americans. What could it be!

In Haley’s case, Trump on Monday posted a screenshot to his Truth Social account of a false story claiming that his Republican presidential opponent is disqualified from being president or vice president because “reports indicate that her parents were not U.S. citizens at the time of her birth in 1972.”

That story, published by the far-right website, The Gateway Pundit, and shared by Trump to his 5.5 million Truth Social followers, is as ugly as it is nonsensical. Haley was born in South Carolina.She is a natural-born U.S. citizen. She is eligible to be president.

But just like he did to Obama, Harris and Cruz when they were his primary political opponents, Trump pushing the racist idea that because Haley has immigrant parents (her parents are from India), she must not be a real American and is therefore disqualified from running for president.

Trump aggressively spread this lie about Obama, for years, fueling wild conspiracy theories about Obama being born in Kenya instead of Hawaii, where he was actually born. Trump routinely demanded that Obama release his full birth certificate to prove where he was born, and when Obama actually did, Trump questioned its authenticity.

After five years of doing this, Trump abruptly reversed course in September