Trump attacks Michelle Obama and accuses her of 'trying to be controversial' in her memoirs

Former first lady says the US President put her family in danger with conspiracy theory about her husband's birthplace

(Rex Features)

Donald Trump hit back at Michelle Obama's claims that he put her "family's safety at risk" by promoting a conspiracy theory that her husband was not born in the US.

The former first lady said she would never forgive Mr Trump for pushing for the “birther conspiracy” about Barack Obama.

Mr Trump actively promoted the idea that his predecessor was a “secret Muslim” born in Kenya, where his father is from, and not really an American citizen, for several years. Mr Obama eventually released his birth certificate which proved he was born in the US state of Hawaii.

In her forthcoming memoir, Becoming, Ms Obama writes: “The whole [birther] thing was crazy and mean-spirited, of course, its underlying bigotry and xenophobia hardly concealed. But it was also dangerous, deliberately meant to stir up the wingnuts and kooks."

“What if someone with an unstable mind loaded a gun and drove to Washington? What if that person went looking for our girls? Donald Trump, with his loud and reckless innuendos, was putting my family’s safety at risk. And for this I’d never forgive him."

Mr Trump responded by accusing her of intentionally “trying to be controversial” in her memoirs.

“‘I guess she wrote a book," he told reporters in Paris, where he was meeting with French president Emmanuel Macron.

"She got paid a lot of money to write a book. And they always insist that you come up with (something) controversial. Well I’ll give you a little controversy back. I’ll never forgive him (Barack Obama) for what he did to our United States military by not funding it properly,” he added. “It was depleted. Everything was old and tired and I came in and I had to fix it and I’m in the process of spending tremendous amounts of money."

He said that he would "never forgive" Mr Obama "for what he did to our military."

He added: “‘I’ll never forgive him for what he did in many other ways, which I’ll talk to you about in the future."