WASHINGTON -- The presumptive Republican nominee for president implied Wednesday that he was right all along to suggest President Barack Obama sympathizes with Islamic terrorists.
Donald Trump, who has long promoted the false conspiracy theory that Obama was born in Kenya, tweeted Wednesday that he was right to raise the possibility a few days ago that Obama secretly sympathizes with radical Muslim terrorists.
Trump's tweet reads: "An: Media fell all over themselves criticizing what DonaldTrump 'may have insinuated about @POTUS.' But he's right." (It's not clear what "An" means. Also, Trump seems to be referring to himself in the third person here, not quoting someone else.)
The tweet also includes a link to a story by the Trump-cheerleading site Breitbart. That story claims that a document obtained by Judicial Watch shows that the Obama administration supported the work of al Qaeda in Iraq -- a predecessor to the self-described Islamic State militant group -- as an opponent of Syrian dictator Bashar Assad.
The Breitbart story doesn't actually appear to support Trump's claim, as The Guardian notes.
On Monday, in the wake of a mass shooting by a terrorist sympathizer in Orlando, Florida, that left 49 people dead, Trump implied that Obama himself was in cahoots with terrorists.
"Look, we're led by a man that either is not tough, not smart, or he's got something else in mind," Trump said on Fox News. "And the something else in mind -- you know, people can't believe it. People cannot, they cannot believe that President Obama is acting the way he acts and can't even mention the words 'radical Islamic terrorism.' There's something going on. It's inconceivable. There's something going on."
In a separate interview Monday, Trump declined to clarify what exactly he meant, saying only, "I'll let people figure that out for themselves."
Trump received a barrage of criticism for his baseless insinuation. Later, he seemed to deny having made it, growing incensed when The Washington Post reported that he had said the thing he said.
In response to the Post's writeup of his Monday remarks, Trump put the newspaper on his lengthy media blacklist. (The Huffington Post is already on the blacklist -- join us!)
In separate Facebook posts, Trump criticized the Post's headline and then announced the blacklisting.
So, to recap: Trump implied that the president sympathizes with terrorists. Then he said it was "phony and dishonest" to report that he'd said such a thing. Then, he suggested that his original comments were right all along.
Editor’s note: Donald Trump regularly incites political violence and is a serial liar, rampant xenophobe, racist, misogynist and birther who has repeatedly pledged to ban all Muslims -- 1.6 billion members of an entire religion -- from entering the U.S.