Governor Elect of Hawaii To Release Obama Birth Record

Honolulu - A Democrat, Governor-Elect Neil Abercrombie knew President Barack Obama's parents when Mr. Obama was a child.

He is deeply troubled by efforts to prove President Obama was born somewhere other than Honolulu and is therefore not a natural born citizen, eligible to serve as President.

Mr. Abercrombie plans to ask the state's attorney general to find ways to release more information about his birth, which occurred on August 4, 1961.

State privacy laws prohibit release of a certified birth certificate to anyone who has no tangible interest.

A spokeswoman for the Governor, Donalyn Dela Cruz said, “He had a friendship with Mr. Obama's parents, and so there is a personal issue at hand. Is it going to be done immediately? No, the first thing on our list is the economy.”

The State Director of Health has verified Mr. Obama's birth at Kapiolani Hospital in Honolulu and has seen published reports of his birth that appeared in newspapers at the time, according to state officials.

Mr. Obama released a certificate of live birth in 2008.

It does not list the hospital where he was born or the name of the doctor who assisted Mrs. Obama's labor. This does not satisfy “birthers,” who claim there is a conspiracy to conceal the President was actually born in Kenya, or perhaps elsewhere in the world.

According to health service spokeswoman Janice Okubo, "It's just a few people, and some of their requests are the same. The requests fluctuate from month to month."

Cathy Takase, acting director for the state Office of Information Practices.usually responds to appeals for Obama's birth records by telling those who make requests that the information they're seeking is contained in records protected by statute.

Mr. Abercrombie, who is 72, moved to Hawaii in 1959, the year the islands became a state.

"What bothers me is that some people who should know better are trying to use this for political reasons," Abercrombie told the Los Angeles Times last week. "Maybe I'm the only one in the country that could look you right in the eye right now and tell you, 'I was here when that baby was born.'"

Certificates of live birth are standardized throughout the United States, stored on computers in vaults that are fire-protected by Halon extinguisher systems, and are printed on 3-D Xerox-proof acid free paper as needed. The changes from an older-fashioned handwritten system from individual counties, cities and hospitals were prompted by a growing need to authenticate citizenship status in a faulty system.

Many people were able to obtain multiple birth certificates by searching death certificates of infants who died crib deaths, applying for their birth certificates, and obtaining driver's licenses, passports and other forms of identification.