The provenance and early promotion of the birther movement came in for new scrutiny Friday as a reporter accused longtime Hillary Clinton friend Sidney Blumenthal of spreading the malicious rumor during the 2008 campaign, just as Donald Trump finally renounced the conspiracy about President Obama Friday.

Trump kicked off a new examination of the myth when he stated Friday that Clinton and her campaign 'started the birther controversy' – which Trump himself fanned for years before finally stating Friday that President Obama was born in the U.S.

It's a position at odds with what fact-checkers have found: that the myth got spread by die-hard Clinton supporters, but not by the campaign itself.

Late Thursday night, former McClatchy newspapers Washington bureau chief James Asher wrote on Twitter that longtime Hillary Clinton friend and advisor Sidney Blumenthal peddled the rumor to him personally in his office.

Former Hillary Clinton 2008 campaign manager Patti Solis Doyle said Friday that Clinton 'did not start' the birther controversy, but acknowledged a state volunteer coordinator sent an email about it and got fired for it

'#CNN says #Hillary team in 2008 never raised #birther issue. #SidBlumenthal, long-time buddy, told me in person #Obama born in #kenya,' Asher wrote.

Asher wrote in another Tweet: '#CNN says #Hillary team in 2008 never raised #Obama's birth in #Kenya. Who is closer to #HRC than #SidBlumenthal, who told me face-to-face.'

Then on Friday, former Clinton 2008 campaign manager Patti Solis Doyle told CNN's Wolf Blitzer Friday that a low-level operative had forwarded an email questioning Obama's U.S. citizenship during the campaign – but said the person got fired for it.

'The campaign nor Hillary did not start the Birther movement, period, end of story there,' she said.

'There was a volunteer coordinator, I believe, in late 2007, I believe, in December, one of our volunteer coordinators in one of the counties in Iowa — I don’t recall whether they were an actual paid staffer, but they did forward an email that promoted the conspiracy,' Doyle said.

The Clinton campaign did not provide immediate comment about the claim about Blumenthal.

Former McClatchy newspapers D.C. bureau chief James Asher claims Clinton pal Sidney Blumenthal peddled the birther rumor to him in person during the 2008 campaign

Donald Trump's claim, which the candidate did not back up, that Clinton started the birther movement, brought new attention to a 2007 memo by pollster Mark Penn urging Clinton to exploit Obama's lack of 'American roots.' The memo does not question Obama's birthplace, however

Top female advisors to Clinton, including Patti Solis Doyle, pictured in 2007, during a hard-hitting primary against Barack Obama

Former McClatchy newspapers Washington bureau chief James Asher claims Clinton pal Sidney Blumenthal raised the issue of Obama's birth in a meeting

Blumenthal is revealed to be in extensive email contact with the candidate in emails released by the State Department

President Obama, pictured in traditional garb on a visit to rural Kenya. Donald Trump's belated renunciation of birtherism is prompting new focus on efforts by the Hillary Clinton campaign during the 2008 campaign to shape his image

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump states that he believes U.S. President Barack Obama was born in the United States at a campaign event at the Trump International Hotel. He claimed Clinton 'started the birther controversy'

Asked if it was about the birther controversy, she responded, 'Yeah, Hillary made the decision immediately to let that person go. We let that person go. And it was so, beyond the pale, Wolf, and so not worthy of the kind of campaign that certainly Hillary wanted to run.'

She said she called Obama campaign manager David Plouffe to apologize 'and basically say that this was not coming from us. It was a rogue volunteer coordinator,' Doyle said. 'And David very graciously accepted my apology.'

With the eight-year-old issue gaining new currency in the presidential campaign, former operatives took to Twitter to vent.

Former George W. Bush press secretary Ari Fleisher wrote, 'Hillary calls on Trump 2apologize for his birther remarks. Will she apologize 4 her staff spreading that rumor when she ran vs Obama in '08?'

'.@AriFleischer you're lying, and you know it, and it's disgusting,' shot back former Obama speechwriter Jon Favreau.

Solis Doyle jumped in: '.@Hillary Clinton or her '08 campaign DID NOT start birther movement. Period. I was there.'

Former Clinton campaign press secretary Mo Elleithee also went after Fleischer: 'No, it is not. The one rogue staffer who sent an email was fired pretty damn quick. This is a lie.'

Solis Doyle added: 'I fired the rogue & I called [Obama campaign manager David Plouffe] to apologize 4 said rogue.'

Fleischer later clarified that he didn't mean to tweet that the Clinton camp spread the birther rumor, but rather the rumor that Obama was a Muslim, in apparent reference to a Drudge Report posting that featured a photo of Obama wearing traditional Muslim garb on a visit to Kenya.

Hillary Clinton arrives for a taping of The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon, in New York Friday. Donald Trump is accusing her of starting the birther controversy about President Obama

An infamous 2007 campaign memo by Clinton advisor Mark Penn advises stressing Barack Obama's 'lack of American roots.' But it doesn't say he was born outside the U.S.

The Trump camp pointed to an infamous March 2007 memo by then-Clinton advisor pollster Mark Penn, which highlighted Obama's perceived 'lack of American roots' as a potential liability.

“[H]is roots to basic American values and culture are at best limited,” wrote Penn. “I cannot imagine electing a president during a time of war who is not at his center fundamentally American in his thinking and in his values.”

Penn went on to advise Clinton to say in every speech she was 'born in the middle of America to the middle class in the middle of the last century' as a way of showing a contrast without going 'negative' – something Clinton frequently did.

But nowhere in the memo does Penn state that Obama might not have been born in the U.S.

Trump campaign spokesman Jason Miller jumped on the developments in a statement. 'With Clinton’s 2008 campaign manager admitting on national television and on Twitter that they promoted the rumors surrounding now-President Obama’s heritage, Mr. Trump has been fully vindicated.'