After five years of saying that President Obama was not born in the United States and therefore not a legitimate president, Donald Trump on Friday reversed his stance with a short statement made at his new hotel in Washington, D.C.

"President Barack Obama was born in the United States," Trump said. "Period." The New York businessman offered no apology for the ongoing attacks on Obama.

However, Trump once again tried to claim that it was Hillary Clinton who started the so-called "birther" movement — she did not — and looked to move past the issue, which has lingered over his campaign for president. "Hillary Clinton in her campaign of 2008 started the birther controversy," Trump said incorrectly. "I finished it."

The fact-checking website Politifact has rated that claim "false." "There is no record that Clinton herself or anyone within her campaign ever advanced the charge that Obama was not born in the United States," the website said.

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid called out Trump's accusation: "Hillary brought it up? What a liar," he said on CNN.

Some in the media complained because Trump's 30-second statement without taking questions from the media attracted nearly a half-hour of non-stop media coverage.

"We got played, again, by the Trump campaign, which is what they do," CNN's John King said on air. "He got a live event broadcast for some 20 minutes." For her part, Clinton offered a prebuttal Friday morning on the campaign trail, saying that even if Trump reversed his view, it doesn't undo his longstanding position on the matter.

