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CEDAR RAPIDS — After getting her hair cut at True Salon in the New Bohemia neighborhood, Kay Hale of Ely saw something a bit unusual taped to the outside of the business’s front door: A photo copy of a birth certificate supposedly from Kenya, and supposedly announcing the birth of President Barack Obama.
“It wasn’t there when I came into the salon, which means that someone taped it onto the front door during the 20 or 30 minutes while I was getting my hair cut,” said Hale, who spoke animatedly about the incident.
The bogus birth certificate hanging in a window.
“Then I saw another one taped to the resell shop next door,” she said, adding that the shop wasn’t open and that she pulled the copy off the door before the business owner saw it.
Of course, the birth certificate is fake, as the president was born in Hawaii.
In August 2009, a man named Lucas Smith offered a copy of the alleged birth certificate for sale on the online auction site eBay. It was immediately latched on to by far-right websites, and the following month Orly Taitz, a realtor-turned-dentist-turned-lawyer, attempted to introduce it as evidence in federal court that Obama was foreign born. It was the second such “birth certificate” filed by Taitz as a part of the case, which prompted U.S. District Court Judge Clay Land to dismiss the complaint and threaten sanctions if Taitz filed any “similarly frivolous” motions in the future.
Conspiracy theories regarding Obama’s birth have circulated pretty much since he announced his bid for the presidency. Birthers, or those who falsely believe that Obama is foreign born and therefore not eligible to serve as president, have filed at least three lawsuits before the U.S. Supreme Court. All were dismissed. Cases filed in lower courts have also not prevailed.
The Obama campaign released a 2007 certified copy of his birth certificate from Hawaii, but the document did little to dampen the conspiracies that he was either born in Africa or Indonesia. Even some Republican elected officials have expressed skepticism about Obama’s citizenship or have avoided directly telling supporters that they believe him to be a citizen, which has only bolstered the birther conspiracies — and perhaps led someone to tape photocopies of a debunked document on local businesses.
Tom Moore, director of the African American Museum of Iowa, which is located roughly a block from the salon and resell shop, said a visitor had pulled a taped copy of the “birth certificate” from their doors and gave it to a volunteer in the gift shop.
“I really don’t know what to think about it,” said Moore, who resisted speculating on who might have left the document and why.
“We have some Obama-related things — mostly items related to the caucus and his time in Iowa,” he said. “This is obviously not something we’d have in our collection.”
Sara Prokop, a stylist at True Salon, was with Hale when the photocopy was discovered, and she isn’t convinced that it was just a spontaneous prank.
“It was taped to the door with packaging tape,” she said. “It was obviously something that someone had thought about and planned to some extent.”
Prokop, like Moore at the museum, was unsure why the salon storefront was chosen.
“It was sort of funny in a way because I had just finished up cutting the hair of a client who is a big-time Republican. I tried to call him — just to tease him about it — but didn’t get an answer,” she said and laughed. “I’d be incredibly shocked if he had anything to do with it. We go to the same church. I just can’t imagine him doing something like that.”
The Cedar Rapids Police Department was contacted by The Iowa Independent about the fliers in an attempt to determine if placing unsolicited material on a business storefront violates the law, but a response was not provided prior to publishing.
Local business owners indicated that they are often asked by individuals and groups to place materials in their storefronts but, to their knowledge, this was the first time anyone had ever placed something without being given prior permission.
“I just think it is wrong,” said Hale, a Democrat. “This so-called birth certificate isn’t real, and someone just wants to keep these stupid rumors going.”
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