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Susan Walsh / AP file
President Barack Obama walks from Marine One after returning to the White House on the South Lawn in Washington, DC, on July 27, 2012.
CHICAGO -- A family history website claims it has linked President Barack Obama to the first documented African slave in the American colonies.
Research by Ancestry.com from early Virginia records and DNA analysis shows Obama is the 11th great-grandson of John Punch, an indentured servant in Colonial Virginia who became enslaved for life after trying to escape in 1640, according to the website.
The findings were released about 100 days out from the presidential election. Obama's campaign headquarters are based in Chicago.
"Remarkably, the connection was made through President Obama's Caucasian mother's side of the family," the site said in a statement.
View NBCChicago.com's story on Ancestry.com claims
Ancestry.com genealogists researched Obama's mother, Stanley Ann Dunham, and discovered her land-owner ancestors descended from Punch. According to the site, Punch had children with a white woman who passed her free status to her children, who went on to become successful land owners in Colonial Virginia.
"Two of the most historically significant African Americans in the history of our country are amazingly directly related," said Ancestry.com genealogist Joseph Shumway in a statement. "John Punch was more than likely the genesis of legalized slavery in America. But after centuries of suffering, the Civil War, and decades of civil rights efforts, his 11th great-grandson became the leader of the free world and the ultimate realization of the American Dream."
Ancestry.com called on a past Board for Certification of Genealogists president to perform a third-party review of the research.
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"A careful consideration of the evidence convinces me that the Y-DNA evidence of African origin is indisputable," said Elizabeth Shown Mills in a statement, "and the surviving paper trail points solely to John Punch as the logical candidate."
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Leave a Comment:
Big friggin deal, he still has no clue on what he is doing, but may shed light on why he Hates America so much
Ooohhhhhh PUUUUULEEEEEEZEEEEE!!!!!
WTF is next?
INDENTURED SERVANT is not slave!
Big deal I'm related to Adam and Eve!!!!!!
Wow, you too...so am I!!!
Wow we are probably long lost cousins!!!!
Going to call BULL@!$%# seems Obama is trying the whole "I am black vote for me"race card that got him elected the first time.Last time i checked Black Father+White Mother=bi-racial child.That is why i will continue to refer to Obama as being bi-racial.
I see all the ignorant, unemployed losers are commenting from their momma's basement at midday.
LOL just got home from work you moron and my home is bought and paid for so why don't you crawl back under your bridge TROLL!!!!
PS I am not an Obama supporter so therefore i have a job.
And I have a good job in a healthy industry that is hiring and I am also an Obama supporter from a battleground state
Alllllrighty....guess I'll vote for him now!
Slow news day or what?
Looks like Morgan Freeman may have to take back his poorly-thought-out comments about Obama not being black enough.
Spoon feeding us crap and we just open wider....
Next they will find molecular evidence of ancestry to Pancho Villa
So, somehow this makes any difference to the @!$%# job he's done over the past 4 years; smoke and mirrors folks. Keep your mind on the facts that matter: Unemployment still over 8%, 7 Trillion in deficit spending with more to come; housing still in the whole, health care in a shambles etc, etc. I don't care who his ancestors are, I do care that he took a bad situation and made it much, much worse...VOTE OBAMA OUT IN NOVEMBER!!!
I am really confused, I thought his mother was white. And does it really matter, not
Of course if the Republicans like Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Rupert Murdock, Donald Trump, and Fox News had their way they would still have great people like President Obama in-slaved and in chains!
Nothing at all great about Obama...that is until they boot him out the front door of the White House come November...that's the only thing that will ever be great in relationship to him. Worst President...ever!
I think its rather fitting. And not all that surprising. Mr.Punch must have been quiet the negotiator to survive as a slave back in those days, especially a slave with a white woman mothering his children.
we are living the real planet of the apes and I hope this addition turns out with humans in charge again
Give me a f***in break.. What complete Sh*t. ...and this mean what exactly? USELESS MEDIA PROPAGANDA.
i have now heard it all....or shall i say read it all
Seems kind of redundant to print this he already has the black vote.
msn sometime you people really suck. How about giving us some real news and not bs
o yea, Romney for President, vote for an American for America. Lets get our country back.
What the report doesn't say is the other half of Obama, a Moslem from Africa. MSNBC's attempt to side track the horrible job Obama has done as President. It won't work MSNBC. Obama is one and done.
Electionnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn timeeeeeeeeeeeeee.LOL Who really cares not I.
Its been 11 YEARS now.......... WHY did building 7 at the World Trade Center fall at 5:45pm from office fires on 3 floors and NO plane hit it....??????????? NOW THATS A QUESTION ??????????????????????????
CONTROLLED DEMOLITION no other way FACT!!!!!!!!!!!
Junk journalism. It never ceases to amaze me how the media attempts to distract the public from the real issues.
Come on MSN - this is clearly a political move by a biased reporting agency - what a bunch of horse crap - are things that bad with barry's ratings that you have to resort to trying to drum up support for him because his white mother descended from the first slave? Are people really that stupid to believe this garbage? What happened to reporting facts and real news instead of trumped up political BS
Interesting how they can trace his mother to the "First slave level" but can not trace Obama to his ancestors and birth in Africa of Indonesia ?? Sound like a lot of political timing to me.
This must have been set in place long ago for the servent to become the host.
And now we will follow this story with a news story about the fake nobama birth certificate and why it is fake so we will have a few less ill informed liberals in the world today. Nobody does news more balanced or fair than NBC, I mean liberals.
Remember kids, liberals have no shame, even if its their job to be unbiased. Thats why they have sayings like, "the ends justify the means" (go ahead and lie, or doctor a tape) or "let no tragedy go to waste". How long until they tried to say the colorado shooter was a tea party member? How long, shame on you libs, shame, oh wait, thats right, liberals have no shame. Just ask andea mitchell from NBC.