By Joe Kovacs
© 2010 WorldNetDaily

Gov. Linda Lingle, R-Hawaii

More than a year and half after Barack Obama was elected commander in chief, the governor of Hawaii is now publicly voicing the alleged exact location of Obama's birth, saying "the president was, in fact, born at Kapi'olani Hospital in Honolulu, Hawaii."

The disclosure is believed to be the first time a state government official has declared the precise place where Obama was born, despite numerous other published claims, including some for a different hospital in Honolulu.

The remark came Sunday night when Gov. Linda Lingle, a Republican, was interviewed on New York's WABC Radio by host Rabbi Shmuley Boteach. (The subject was addressed at the 77-minute mark.)

"It's been an odd situation," Lingle said, referring to the continuing controversy over the disputed natural-born citizenship of Obama. "This issue kept coming up so much in the campaign, and again I think it's one of those issues that is simply a distraction from the more critical issues that are facing the country.

"So I had my health director, who is a physician by background, go personally view the birth certificate in the birth records of the Department of Health, and we issued a news release at that time saying that the president was, in fact, born at Kapi'olani Hospital in Honolulu, Hawaii. And that's just a fact and yet people continue to call up and e-mail and want to make it an issue and I think it's again a horrible distraction for the country by those people who continue this."

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The Kapi'olani Medical Center for Woman and Children in Hawaii is one of two Honolulu hospitals at which that President Obama is alleged to have been born.

Although the governor now claims she issued a news release stating Kapi'olani is Obama's birthplace, the actual release said no such thing, making no reference to Kapi'olani nor any other specific location of Obama's birth.

At the time of the 2008 election, the release featured the state's director of health, Chiyome Fukino, who said: "There have been numerous requests for Sen. Barack Hussein Obama's official birth certificate. State law (Hawaii Revised Statutes §338-18) prohibits the release of a certified birth certificate to persons who do not have a tangible interest in the vital record.

"Therefore, I as Director of Health for the State of Hawai'i, along with the Registrar of Vital Statistics who has statutory authority to oversee and maintain these type of vital records, have personally seen and verified that the Hawaii State Department of Health has Sen. Obama's original birth certificate on record in accordance with state policies and procedures.

"No state official, including Governor Linda Lingle, has ever instructed that this vital record be handled in a manner different from any other vital record in the possession of the State of Hawaii."

Months later, in July 2009, she added another comment: "I, Dr. Chiyome Fukino, Director of the Hawaii State Department of Health, have seen the original vital records maintained on file by the Hawaii State Department of Health verifying Barack Hussein Obama was born in Hawaii and is a natural-born American. I have nothing further to add to this statement or my original statement issued in October 2008 over eight months ago."

Lingle's radio statement could add further confirmation that a long-form, hospital-generated birth ceritifcate still exists, despite a February report by Britain's Sky News which stated: "Authorities in Hawaii have provided an electronic record of Obama's birth because the paper copy was destroyed in a fire which wiped out much of the state's archives."

Ironically, the governor's pinpointing of the Kapi'olani Medical Center for Women and Children as well as her health director's previous public statements on the matter statement are in apparent violation of Hawaii state law.

In two separate telephone interviews with WND, Janice Okubo, the Health Department's public information officer, told WND that Hawaii law prohibited her from commenting on the birth records of any specific person.

Okubo cited Hawaii Revised Statutes Section 338-18, which pertains to "Disclosure of Records."

That section states regarding the release of vital statistics records, "The department shall not permit inspection of public health statistics records, or issue a certified copy of any such record or part thereof, unless it is satisfied that the applicant has a direct and tangible interest in the record."

More than one hospital?

An intriguing aspect to the story is that Kapi'olani is not the only Honolulu hospital touted as Obama's place of birth. Another facility, the Queen's Medical Center, has also been mentioned as the actual site in numerous publications, including United Press International and the online, myth-busting site Snopes.com.