US Election Misinformation: The Week That Was
October 17, 2020
Take a breath, because that was another batshit crazy week in a batshit crazy election. As I look back on my notes from Monday, I’m struck by how long ago all that stuff feels.
The election is just 17 days away. Misinformation is really finding its moment, but sadly truth is struggling. I wonder how we’ll look back on the content in this newsletter in the months and years to come? Growing up, I never thought enough time was being devoted to the substantive issues that affect people as a result of elections, and to read all the inaccuracies and misleading claims below, we seem further than ever from actually discussing the real issues that will affect the American people (and same goes for lots of other countries). Maybe this is a darker view than the reality because I am so close to it all, or maybe it’s… actual reality.
As always, I’m trying to synthesise the many different things happening at a noisy time and make some sense of it all in one place. This is very much a learning process so feel free to send me your thoughts on what you need to see more or less of, what works, what doesn’t, etc.
Hacked emails redux
I wonder if “but his emails” will become a thing? Maybe not so much. Biden has Twitter and Facebook to thank for that, and maybe being a man helps.
There’s been a flurry of excitement since The New York Post reported that a “smoking-gun email” reveals that Hunter Biden introduced a Ukrainian businessman to Joe Biden, Vice President at the time.
But there are some big questions as to the veracity of the source of this story and whether the emails are in fact authentic. Still plenty of digging being done by journalists into all this.
As always, it’s important to consider the source. The person who seems to be behind a lot of this gave a rather bizarre interview to the Daily Beast; he certainly appears to have some problems.
But very quickly the “meta-story” became the bigger story. When Facebook and Twitter acted to deliberately slow down the spread of this story, outrage followed. Many misinformation researchers have been demanding more quick and bold decisions from platforms, but this move didn’t satisfy anyone — in particular Twitter, as they temporarily blocked people from being able to post the link.
Cue shitshow.
As an example, many of the top threads on Reddit/r/conspiracy have been referencing what they believe is evidence of censorship by Big Tech when there’s a story hurting a liberal candidate:
The Twitter account of the White House press secretary, Kayleigh McEnany, was locked because she had posted the New York Post story.
Cue more outrage and days of talking points.
Later, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey said the company’s communication around their actions with the NYP story was “not great”. Now, they are allowing posts about the article again. But the whole thing has been an utter mess.
Later a satirical site, the Babylon Bee, produced a spoof story claiming that Twitter deliberately had an outage to slow the spread of anti-Biden news. This is a joke site — like The Onion or Waterford Whispers for my Irish readers. But, you guessed, Trump retweeted it as if it was real. A lot of people need a long course in media literacy, and the US President should be top of the list.
Back to the original story and the amateur online detectives are digging in; one such example that is being talked about in QAnon circles is that there is incriminating evidence on Hunter Biden’s computer regarding child pornography. Of course, no evidence to that effect has come to light.
Batshit crazy
It may feel like years ago now but let’s remember that during the week Trump promoted a theory that Obama ordered the killing of dozens of his own troops (Seal Team 6) and paid a bribe to Iran to cover it up. The theory also alleges that the US did not kill Osama bin Laden but rather a body double.
Misinformation Miscellany
Last weekend, a tweet from Jon Cooper went viral which claimed that Trump was preparing to resign. The tweet has been removed. Cooper has a history of spreading misinformation.
Trump claimed he is “immune” to COVID-19. Twitter placed a warning label on the tweet. There is no evidence that people are immune after being infected, and there have been cases where people have been reinfected.
Anthony Fauci appeared to support Trump in a campaign ad but the physician said that his comments were taken out of context, as reported by CNN.
For a number of days, anti-vaccine activists and COVID deniers have been sharing a petition called The Great Barrington Declaration. It is essentially an argument for a herd immunity strategy with misleading statistics. Lots of fake names are on the signatory list, as well as people who are not experts in COVID-19. Last weekend the Team (Herman) Cain account posted about it to over 500,000 followers. Cain died of COVID-19 earlier this year.
Ballot misinformation is still a huge deal. Almost every day there is a new viral video alleging some impropriety. But don’t forget that this week the California Republican Party set up unauthorized drop-boxes for mail-in ballots, which is illegal. More details from Snopes here. PragerU posted a video to YouTube titled “How to Steal an Election: Mail-In Ballots.” It has over 650,000 views since being uploaded less than 24 hours ago. I continue to see lots of speculation about “civil war” as a result of neither side believing in the outcome of the election, which is deeply worrying.
The Washington Post reported that an investigation into whether the Obama administration improperly redacted names in intelligence reports for political reasons has found no wrongdoing. This issue of “unmasking” has been one of the Trump/QAnon areas of interest as they alleged it was part of a campaign against Michael Flynn.
In place of a debate, both candidates held town halls. At his event, Trump refused to condemn QAnon, claiming not to know much about the movement, and then seeming to offer praise by saying it is strongly against pedophlia. AP and Politifact have fact checks of the town halls, if you’re into that sort of thing.
Other Platform Developments
Facebook announced a ban on ads that discourage people from getting a vaccine.
Reuters reported that Twitter suspended a number of accounts claiming to be Black Trump supporters for spam and manipulation.
YouTube announced it will “prohibit content that targets an individual or group with conspiracy theories that have been used to justify real-world violence.” They specifically referenced QAnon and Pizzagate.
Reuters reported that YouTube has banned misinformation about COVID-19 vaccines.
Bloomberg reported that Twitter will now remove posts that deny the Jewish Holocaust.