Before the internet took hold, rightwing pundits and televangelists mailed out vast catalogs of propaganda, most designed to trick the faithful into sending them money.
They’d use photos of African children and dying AIDS patients. You’d open your mailbox and see a misshapen infant staring out at you, begging you for just a few dollars a month. It was disturbing. They didn’t mind gore–in fact, the more the better, and they lied shamelessly.
They used their mailers to influence politics, both in the United States and abroad. In Africa, they supported militias who committed atrocities in the name of Christ. In China, they built radicalized insurgent groups in an effort to overthrow the government.
There were hundreds of fake charities and coked-out evangelists, bilking senior citizens for millions of dollars a year. They’d work with the White House and rightwing congressmen to build intricate narratives, painting themselves as freedom fighters for the Lord, working to stop non-Christians and homosexuals from destroying God’s righteous kingdom.
According to them, evil was waiting around every corner. Satan was coming for your kids, and the only way to stop him was to empty your checking account and send every cent you had to an old drunk with a bad toupee.
At the time it was difficult to understand how anyone could buy what they were selling. But they had the power of faith on their side. They were Christian, and in their fringe community, anything with a Jesus label on it was automatically seen as good.
The media did their best to warn people. There was one scandal after another–drugs, prostitutes, gay lovers, and exposés on their lavish lifestyles. The word got out. People knew there were bad apples in the bunch. But those apples kept earning and churning out pamphlets–buying yachts and private jets–and while many of them have since died or crashed and burned, a few have managed to hold on to power.
The Evolution of Rightwing Propaganda
In 1984, Rush Limbaugh hit the scene with a talk radio show centered around the Gish gallop, a rhetorical technique used to overwhelm the audience with lies.
He spoke fast, making it difficult to fact-check his statements, and he focused on emotion and humor rather than headlines. Very few people questioned him. They didn’t want to. He was on their side, and they were already convinced.
His entire reputation was based on trust. Any product he promoted flew off the shelves. Everything he said, no matter how ridiculous, was taken as the gospel truth, even after he was arrested on drug charges.
He achieved an unprecedented level of virality early in his career, and his influence just kept spreading. Soon more pundits joined in, forming an ever-expanding network of conservative commentators, all of whom peddled paper-thin rhetoric.
They dominated the airwaves, cable television, and eventually social media. The consequences of their actions and the effect they’ve had on the public discourse cannot be understated. Bill O’Reilly and Sean Hannity had presidents answering their calls. They broke records with their viewership, and they’re still a force to be reckoned with.
But Donald Trump is the true king of misinformation. His tactics and those of his followers haven’t changed much since the days of slug mail newsletters. Hungry Africans have been switched out for hungry Haitians. Instead of rabid pagans and homosexuals, he’s demonizing migrants, minorities, and the left, channeling all of the sloppy, frenzied hysteria that so many of us see as a red flag.
Countering Trump’s Lies
In American politics, the conventional wisdom is that the truth is neither left nor right but somewhere in the middle. It’s hard to imagine anyone lying as much as Trump. But the truth can be counterintuitive, and it doesn’t necessarily fit in with our partisan worldview. A lie is anything we want it to be, which makes it easier to digest.
Donald Trump uses deceit because it allows him to keep a tight reign on the core beliefs of his followers. He has a specific message and a small body of political arguments, which you’ll see repeated over and over again throughout the election. They’re backed up by an even smaller body of content, including videos, pictures, and quotes. There’s some variety, but not much. You’d think that would make it easy to counter what they’re saying. But his followers are known for their mental gymnastics.
Hardcore Trump fans have an ironclad resistance to logic. Converting them could take years. But they’re not the only ones voting for him. Independents like to lurk and sift through posts without actually engaging in discussion. They make up the majority of social media users, and they can be swayed. Once they see how easy it is to cut through Trump’s rhetoric, they’re more likely to side with Harris.
Use this post as a cheat sheet. Copy links. Take screenshots. Spread it around and counter Trump’s lies wherever you see them. That might not seem like much, but we are in the middle of an information war, and the only way to stop it is to reason with the American public. People have been seeing success with these tactics. You can make a difference in your own small way, even if it seems like you’re not getting anywhere.
Trump’s Biggest Lies in the 2024 Election
Haitian Migrants Are Doing Something Unspeakable to Kittens
During the debate, Donald Trump made a wild claim about Haitian migrants in Springfield, Ohio. We can’t directly reference it, but that doesn’t matter. By now the entire world knows exactly what he said. Conservatives will tell you they have it on video, like the arrest tape of Allexis Ferrell, an American citizen falsely labeled as a Haitian migrant. There are recordings of Springfield citizens making the same claims in a town hall and a photo of a man holding a goose in a completely different city. Some creative propagandists have also managed to pull up pictures of bushmeat in Africa and someone kneeling over what looks like roadkill. But there is no actual footage of the act, just mislabeled photos, hearsay, and videos taken out of context–common tricks used by the right.
Springfield, Ohio has been on high alert ever since the president made his unhinged declaration. There have been dozens of bomb threats, some directed at local schools and government buildings, and the Proud Boys were seen marching through the streets. The city has made it very clear that Trump’s claims are completely baseless.
Kamala Harris is Not a Communist
For decades the right has been spreading the lie that Democrats are communists in disguise, secretly bent on curbing our rights and taking over the market. They use social programs like universal healthcare and food stamps as proof. But social programs are a hallmark of progressivism, not communism, and conservatives rarely take the time to look up either term. Some will go half their lives without checking.
It’s often pointed out that Kamala’s father was a Marxist professor. Trump used that in the debate to accuse her of being a communist. But while it is true that her father wrote about communism, it’s not fair to accuse Kamala of holding the same views. She doesn’t. None of her policies even remotely resemble communism. It’s all textbook progressivism.
Biden and Kamala Can Close the Border Right Now and Stop Migrants from Coming Through
Trump has maintained throughout Biden’s presidency that the administration has ended all border enforcement, allowing immigrants to walk across unhindered. This is patently false. The border patrol still works tirelessly to stop the flow of migrants and contraband, and President Biden has taken measures to increase restrictions.
During the debate, Trump challenged him to shut the entire border down, claiming that the president had the power to do so at any time. He does not, and if he did the country would face an Armageddon scenario. It would take away 5 million jobs, cost the US billions of dollars in trade daily, and rob consumers of basic goods like produce. Mexico is the United States’ third-largest trading partner and a vital food supplier. We need shipments to come in on time if we want food.
Trump knows that. That’s why he kept threatening a full shutdown without actually following through. There was a partial closure in March 2020, which allowed the passage of basic goods, but it wasn’t the lockdown he promised. Biden also considered similar measures in January of 2024.
None of this matters of course because illegals don’t just walk through the front door. They climb the wall, dig tunnels, swim, build rafts, and go on treks through the desert. Their resilience cannot be understated. Every summer countless souls walk on foot from Central America to Mexico’s northern border, passing through warzones and human trafficking hunting grounds, and they’ll do all of that with toddlers strapped to their backs. Shutting down the crossings won’t stop anyone determined to reach the US. That’s why the wall was such a joke.
Violent Crime Is Up Because of Migrants
Trump’s most insidious lie is his insistence that migrants are driving up crime rates in the country. To back up their claims, supporters have been going from one forum to the next posting clips of minorities committing crimes. There’s no context, no explanation for the videos, and no way of connecting them to migrants. Instead, they rely on false labels and fake watermarks.
This tactic is everywhere. It can be found on every major social media website, including Facebook, Reddit, Twitter, and Truth Social. The videos are often accompanied by slurs and threats of violence–and not just a few. Thousands will respond, leaving behind pages and pages of blood-curdling hate speech. It’s a disturbing trend, and it’s one that’s taken over mainstream conservativism.
There’s absolutely no truth to these claims. The numbers show that violent crime has dramatically fallen to its lowest in 50 years. Migrants have less contact with the police than non-migrants, and there has been an extensive effort to track the spread of anti-migrant propaganda.
We Shouldn’t Elect Kamala Because She’s Already in Power and She Hasn’t Fixed Anything
Trump is the nation’s biggest sore loser, so it should come as no surprise that he’s spent the past four years headlining a massive campaign to undermine the Biden administration. In many ways, he’s succeeded. Biden’s approval rating hovered around 40% for most of his time in office. Now Trump is using Biden’s reputation to smear Kamala by saying that she already had her chance to fix things.
From an uninformed perspective this makes total sense. The vice president is seen as a president’s partner in crime. They’re supposed to take on a similar level of responsibility. But the truth is that aside from the vice president’s place in the line of succession, their role is mostly symbolic. They’re meant to act as the President of the Senate, but they don’t preside over daily affairs, and they can only vote if there’s a tie. They’re also meant to help certify elections, which America learned the hard way on January 6th.
The vice president does have unofficial duties they can fulfill. They’re often used as a principal advisor to the president, working closely with them during key events, though this does vary depending on the administration. They also make public appearances, and they’re known to perform ceremonial duties in place of the president.
When confronted with the reality of the vice president’s role, conservatives will often point to Kamala’s work on the border. They usually refer to her as the “Border Czar” and claim that she had complete control over Biden’s policy in the region. That’s not the case, and while this is a complicated matter, which warrants further research, all you really need to know that is Kamala never had the constitutional authority necessary to fix the country. That’s easily referenced, and it directly counters their main point.
Kamala’s Nonexistent Plan is Biden’s/Trump’s Plan
Trump made three contradictory claims about Kamala’s proposed policies during the debate. First, he said Kamala had no plan. Then he said she copied his plan, and then he said she copied Biden’s plan. Obviously none of that is true.
Kamala’s plan was already up on her website long before the debate. It’s extensive. It includes legal strategy, taxes, and laws, and it covers basically every major issue in this election. Conservatives love to say that it’s vague. But it’s actually quite specific, and it relies on the courts just as much as it relies on Congress, which will allow her to get things done regardless of which party controls the Senate and the House.
Trump’s plan is also public–and while Biden’s is not available, many of his policies for this election can be found online.
Kamala is Refusing to Debate Trump
The morning after the debate, Donald Trump called in to Fox and Friends to air his grievances and announce that the event was rigged. He took issue with the fact-checking. He wanted them to call Kamala out on what he claimed to be lies, and he doubled down on a few of his own. Ever since then, he has refused to debate Kamala. In response, she released a statement saying, “It would be unprecedented in modern history for there to just be one general election debate. Debates offer a unique chance for voters to see the candidates side by side and take stock of their competing visions for America.”
Donald Trump Will Only Contest the Election If It’s Unfair
In a recent interview, Donald Trump claimed that he lost the 2020 election “by a whisker.” Headlines started sprouting up, declaring that he was finally willing to tell the truth. But when he was asked about that interview in the debate, he backtracked, claiming that he was just being sarcastic.
Trump knows he lost. He refuses to acknowledge it publicly, instead preferring to gaslight anyone that contradicts him, but he has talked about it behind-the-scenes. In a recent court filing put out by Special Counsel Jack Smith–who is investigating Trump’s election interference case–it was reported that an unnamed assistant overheard him telling his family, “It doesn’t matter if you won or lost the election. You still have to fight like hell.” This is just one of countless examples of people around him claiming that he admitted defeat.
He’s already laying the groundwork for another assault on American democracy. He’s sowing doubt by telling his allies that the DOJ is rigging the election. He’s posting and reposting false voting claims regularly on Truth Social. He even has Republicans passing laws in his favor to make it easier to steal the election. In fact, the entire Republican party has been taken over by his allies–including his daughter-in-law, Lara Trump–and they are working overtime to undermine our voting rights.
The man has no shame. He is the still the same pathetic beast that stood up onstage and sent a violent mob to ransack the capitol–a coup the likes of which this country has never seen–and we’ve been warned about him. His former lawyer and fixer, Michael Cohen, declared in 2019 that if he lost the 2020 election, there would be no peaceful transfer of power. He wasn’t the only one who predicted the incident. I myself looked him in the eye four years before January 6th, and right then and there, I knew what he was going to do. That is because, like so many others, I understood him. He wants what he wants, and he will do anything to get it. He has said that countless times over a period of decades. Now he wants to take away our sacred all-necessary right to elect our leaders, and we have to stop him.
