This all started with a Newsweek op-ed. Then POTUS and Kushner were asked repeatedly about it.

Besides, McCain, Cruz and others have been subject to similar scrutiny on the whole natural-born citizenship front.

Media really love this narrative. They can stop it at any time. https://twitter.com/secupp/status/1294471053037768706

The idea that a bunch of mainline conservatives would advance such nonsense is ludicrous. One guy wrote an op-ed, Trump and Kushner basically don’t pay it much mind when asked about it and no one I know takes it seriously in either party.

Media. Love. To. Manufacture. Drama.

A clear benefit of reinforcing a narrative of GOP birtherism is it gives purportedly mainstream journalists the opportunity to - in pursuit of fact-checking of course - make gratuitous swipes at conservatives broadly, even though no one on the right is making such an argument.

They allow conservatives to be identified by a tiny and unserious fringe. Meanwhile, extremists on the Left are elected to office (AOC, Omar and basically all their primary challengers) and given legitimacy by the press who simultaneously excuse or downplay their radical ideas.