A supporter of Donald Trump who sets fire to his house by wanting to burn an LGBT+ flag. A conservative think tank advocating the creation of a “menstrual passport” to monitor women’s cycles. News, misinformation or satire?
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Shared thousands of times, without mention of their satirical nature, this false information taken out of context worries researchers less than a month before the American presidential election as it has become part of the arsenal of political disinformation online.
The nonprofit News Literacy Project (NLP) calls them “stolen satires.” “Some people don’t see the joke and take it at face value,” Hannah Covington, manager of this specialized NGO, explains to AFP.
Shortly before the start of the American football season, widely relayed posts seriously indicated that the Minnesota Vikings team had disavowed the governor of this state in the northern United States, Tim Walz, running mate of Democratic candidate Kamala Harris.
However, this false information was first published on the famous Facebook page America’s Last Line of Defense, created by Christopher Blair and known for parodying current events by inventing far-fetched headlines. “Nothing on this page is true,” claim its administrators.
“Confirm your prejudices”
For Christopher Blair, if these publications are also shared at face value it is because they correspond to “the world view of some who favor information that supports their prejudices”.
“They don’t necessarily share them because they believe in them (…) what is true or not no longer matters for about 35 million Americans. If that’s what they want to hear, they’ll broadcast it,” he told AFP.
“Sharing dangerous misinformation in the form of inconsequential jokes” has become a key element in the battle between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump, says Casey Newton, author of the specialist newsletter Platformer, with both camps having a field day over social networks.
A viral post ridicules a Trump supporter in Iowa who allegedly set his house on fire while trying to burn an LGBT+ flag, with comments calling him “stupid” and “homophobic.”
Another asserts that “Project 2025”, an ultra-conservative program – notably on abortion, immigration and even public service – created by a think tank close to Donald Trump, would recommend the creation of a “menstrual passport” for monitor women’s cycles or pregnancies. The Heritage Foundation, behind this program, told AFP that it was “totally false”.
Both posts actually come from the Halfway Post, founded by political satirist Dash MacIntyre after the election of Donald Trump in 2016.
“Not my fault”
The latter claims that his goal is not to “spread false information”, but that politicians deserve caricature in these times of “political insanity”.
“It’s not my fault that so many people take seriously the fictional incidents involving Trump that I imagine to criticize and satirize his horrible personality,” he told AFP.
“There will always be gullible and poorly informed people, but I don’t think that means that satirical comedy has no place” on social networks, he defends himself.
But Hannah Covington recalls that some exploit these publications by decontextualizing them to “transform indignation into clicks”.
Elon Musk, owner of has “no idea how to run a country”.
This fake video was first published on X with the clear mention that it was a parody, but this mention was not taken up by the billionaire who has more than 200 million subscribers.
For Hannah Covington, it is important that these mentions are kept to recall the context: “most platforms do not have real rules” for this type of content. “It is therefore up to users to check before sharing.”
