Obama campaign fundraising off Romney birth certificate joke

President Obama's reelection campaign is fundraising off a birth certificate joke by Mitt Romney.

The Friday fundraising email came a few hours after Romney, during a campaign event in Michigan, made a joke alluding to a conspiracy theory that Obama is not a natural born citizen.

"No one's ever asked to see my birth certificate. They know that this is the place that we were born and raised," Romney said.

"They know that this is the place that we were born and raised," Obama campaign manager Jim Messina wrote in the fundraising email. "Take a moment or two to think about that, what he's actually saying, and what it says about Mitt Romney."

The comment points to fringe claims that Obama has only been pretending to be born in the United States and has been using a fake birth certificate. President Obama has disproven those claims by producing both his birth certificate and his original, longform, birth certificate.

After the former Massachusetts governor made the remark, aides stressed that Romney does not believe Obama was born in another country.

Meanwhile, the Obama campaign said by making the comment, Romney "embraced the most strident voices in his party instead of standing up to them."