CHRIS CUOMO (HOST): You know it went nowhere with President Obama. Yes, there was a little bit of this intrigue about the birth certificate, different forms early on. But it went nowhere. It should have gone nowhere. It's good that it went nowhere. Now we're seeing it again with Senator Cruz. Your man, Donald Trump is saying, I'm not saying it but it's out there. Doesn't seem to be fair play going on. Do you think this should be dispensed with at once?
JEFFREY LORD: Well, first of all, there are people out there, Congressman Alan Grayson, a Democrat from Florida just this past November promised that if Ted Cruz were nominated he personally would file what he called a, “beautiful lawsuit,” saying that Ted Cruz was not qualified to be president. So all Trump is saying here is, this is fact. Somebody said somebody is going to do this; somebody has already promised, a member of Congress and a Democrat, he's promised to do it. So it's a fact.
ALISYN CAMEROTA (HOST): Should we be basing policy on Alan Grayson and the things that he says, which are known to be provocative?
JOHN AVLON: Um yeah, no. This is the first time -- to hear Jeffrey Lord sort of accept the trolling by Alan Grayson as an article of faith and to not denounce it on its face sort of feeds the fundamental problem here. I mean, and let's not forget, this is Donald Trump returning to his roots, folks. In 2012, when he flirted with running to the presidency, he was basically on a birther ticket. And that was all he kept stirring up. This was the same role that Grayson allegedly wants to play with Ted Cruz that Donald Trump played the first time around. So let's get real about the insinuation, and of course the delicious irony here is that while 51 percent of Republicans at one point doubted whether President Obama was born in the United States and was eligible to be president, that's an important reality check. That the scenario they fantasized about on the face of it would be what happened with Ted Cruz, who was born in Canada. However, given that his parents were American, given a case law going back to George Romney and others, it's irrelevant, folks. So give up the ghost.
