The reveal of much of the right wing influencer network being funded by Russian state actors makes this more understandable.
https://apnews.com/article/russian-interference-presidential...
It goes from bottom to top with Tulsi Gabbard parroting Russian talking points on Russian state TV then from the White House and now those right wing influencers repeating Russian talking points at White House press conferences. It's probably the most successful adversarial state sponsored social engineering effort ever.