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How a lie about George Soros and the migrant caravan multiplied online
This is the life of a lie.
Three weeks ago, a caravan of Hondurans began walking nearly 2,000 miles to the United States. Their ranks grew as they inched north and, along with them, falsehoods grew, too. But one stands out: a conspiracy theory that liberal billionaire George Soros, a Jewish immigrant, is paying the migrants to make the journey – or even orchestrating it.
Members of Congress and the president’s son both repeated it. Conservative celebrities, too.
It also may have resonated in darker places. Cesar Sayoc, the man charged with mailing pipe bombs to Soros and other prominent critics of President Donald Trump, dwelled at length online about conspiracy theories involving the Hungarian-American philanthropist. Robert Bowers, charged with killing 11 people worshiping in a Pittsburgh synagogue on Saturday, used his social media accounts to post extensively about the caravan, including circulating an image of refugees in Guatemala purportedly climbing into a truck with a Star of David on the side.
But it began with a handful of posts in the caravan’s early days.
One of the first was from a North Carolina writer who goes by the screen name “lorettatheprole.” Loretta Malakie has more than 6,000 followers on Twitter, to whom she directs frequent posts about “white genocide,” Jews and the “invading force” approaching the border.
On Oct. 14, Malakie posted a link to an article about the caravan, with a single word of commentary: “Soros.”
That same day, identical posts appeared over the course of 20 minutes in six pro-Trump Facebook groups. Combined, those six groups had 165,000 members. A user who gave the name Philip Balzano, a Trump supporter from Chicago, wrote to the Trump Train group: “Here Comes ANOTHER Group of Paid for New Demoncratic Voters Just in Time for the Primaries... The Financier aka ‘Win at All Costs’ ‘Never Let a Good Crisis Go to Waste’ the Evil George Soros and His 140+ Orgs, Should Be Classified as Terrorist and Terrorist Orgs.”
Malakie declined to comment, though on Twitter she panned the USA TODAY reporter who called her as “evil.” Balzano did not respond to an interview request sent through Facebook.
https://www.wgrz.com/article/news/nation-now/how-a-lie-about-george-soros-and-the-migrant-caravan-multiplied-online/465-7559e63d-9f03-4ed9-bfbb-efebbb959317
Three weeks ago, a caravan of Hondurans began walking nearly 2,000 miles to the United States. Their ranks grew as they inched north and, along with them, falsehoods grew, too. But one stands out: a conspiracy theory that liberal billionaire George Soros, a Jewish immigrant, is paying the migrants to make the journey – or even orchestrating it.
Members of Congress and the president’s son both repeated it. Conservative celebrities, too.
It also may have resonated in darker places. Cesar Sayoc, the man charged with mailing pipe bombs to Soros and other prominent critics of President Donald Trump, dwelled at length online about conspiracy theories involving the Hungarian-American philanthropist. Robert Bowers, charged with killing 11 people worshiping in a Pittsburgh synagogue on Saturday, used his social media accounts to post extensively about the caravan, including circulating an image of refugees in Guatemala purportedly climbing into a truck with a Star of David on the side.
But it began with a handful of posts in the caravan’s early days.
One of the first was from a North Carolina writer who goes by the screen name “lorettatheprole.” Loretta Malakie has more than 6,000 followers on Twitter, to whom she directs frequent posts about “white genocide,” Jews and the “invading force” approaching the border.
On Oct. 14, Malakie posted a link to an article about the caravan, with a single word of commentary: “Soros.”
That same day, identical posts appeared over the course of 20 minutes in six pro-Trump Facebook groups. Combined, those six groups had 165,000 members. A user who gave the name Philip Balzano, a Trump supporter from Chicago, wrote to the Trump Train group: “Here Comes ANOTHER Group of Paid for New Demoncratic Voters Just in Time for the Primaries... The Financier aka ‘Win at All Costs’ ‘Never Let a Good Crisis Go to Waste’ the Evil George Soros and His 140+ Orgs, Should Be Classified as Terrorist and Terrorist Orgs.”
Malakie declined to comment, though on Twitter she panned the USA TODAY reporter who called her as “evil.” Balzano did not respond to an interview request sent through Facebook.
https://www.wgrz.com/article/news/nation-now/how-a-lie-about-george-soros-and-the-migrant-caravan-multiplied-online/465-7559e63d-9f03-4ed9-bfbb-efebbb959317
Just remember if you repeat the lie long enough it becomes fact, and that's exactly what happened here.
