The Democratic Roots of the Birther Movement

The idea that Barack Obama wasn’t born in the U.S. and is therefore an illegitimate president—an idea thoroughly discredited after Obama released his long-form birth certificate last year—was mainlined into the femoral artery of the presidential campaign on Tuesday, as Mitt Romney prepared for his high-profile fundraiser in Las Vegas with Donald Trump. Trump is the loudest, brashest, most insistent exponent of “birtherism,” and Romney’s public embrace of him has brought it roaring back. “Is it the most important thing?” Trump said on CNBC on Tuesday. “In a way it is, because you’re not allowed to be president if you’re not born in the country.”

People of every persuasion tend to be baffled about why birtherism stubbornly persists. Many dismiss it as a loopy, far-right conspiracy theory, the province of a few wild-eyed zealots and racists whom the media cannot resist. But on every level it’s a much broader phenomenon.