President Clinton said Monday he will call a California man who says he recently discovered that he is the president's half-brother.
"I have tried to call him today and have not talked to him yet," Clinton told radio station WCBS in New York. "I think I ought to talk to him before I make any public statements. I'll put out a statement on it later on today."W.J. Blythe, Clinton's father, died in a car accident a few months before the future president was born in 1946. The Washington Post reported Sunday that birth and marriage certificates show that Blythe also fathered Henry Leon Ritzenthaler, 55.
Betsey Wright, a Washington lobbyist who kept Clinton's personal records during the presidential campaign, said Sunday she heard rumors last year of a half-brother.
"We heard so many different stories and rumors, and Bill's attitude about his father was: Let his father rest in peace," she told The Associated Press on Sunday.
White House spokeswoman Dee Dee Myers confirmed that Clinton "knew about the allegations" before the Post story was published, but she said the White House had no comment Sunday.
The Post uncovered marriage and birth certificates that appear to confirm that Ritzenthaler, who lives in Paradise, Calif., is Clinton's half-brother. Blythe's name is listed as the father on Rit-zen-thaler's birth certificate.
Adele Gash Coffelt, Ritzenthaler's mother, told the Post that she and Blythe were 17 when they married in 1935. They divorced a short time later, before Ritzenthaler was conceived.
Clinton's mother, Virginia Kelley, told the Post that she didn't know about Blythe's first son.
Virginia Kelley later married Roger Clinton, and the couple had a son, Roger. Clinton, born William Jefferson Blythe IV, took his stepfather's name when he was 15.
Adele Coffelt told the Post that she didn't discover that Blythe was Clinton's father until a relative sent her a magazine clipping during the presidential campaign.
However, Blythe's sister, Vera Ramey, says Ritzenthaler is not Blythe's son. She told the Post a married man fathered the child and that Blythe claimed paternity to prevent a family scandal.
"We don't want to intrude in their lives," Ritzenthaler said Sunday.
"It would be an honor and privilege to meet the man. He's busy and has a lot of work to do. He and Hillary are both intelligent people."
Ritzenthaler of Paradise said his mother told him last June that he and Clinton had the same father.