Law enforcement officials quickly launched an investigation into the Saturday shooting of Donald Trump as an assassination attempt. But there were few confirmed details, and into that void, a torrent of unsubstantiated theories flooded social media and other channels, fueling false and dueling realities. In the midst of a fluid presidential race, the shooting’s aftermath offered a window into how quickly false conspiracy theories can spread online in today’s hypercharged political environment.
Even after investigators identified the shooter and confirmed some details of the attack, conspiracies that were born Saturday evening hardened into narratives that further politicized the violence.
Some accounts from the left of the political spectrum immediately claimed that the shooting was a “false flag” operation perpetrated by Trump’s own supporters. Some on the far right accused President Biden of ordering a hit on a political rival.
“Incidents of political violence spawn conspiracy theories and false narratives when people try to spin the event to suit their various agendas,” Megan Squire, deputy director for data analytics at the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Intelligence Project, told The Washington Post. “This incident is no different, with people concocting ‘false flag’ conspiracies and even blaming innocent people for either committing this crime or inspiring it.”
The dynamic is only exacerbated, experts say, by the current political environment, in which Americans increasingly cannot agree on a common set of facts, and increasingly exist in alternate — and separate — realities.
Minutes after shots were fired, right-wing social media influencers and elected Republicans began suggesting that powerful figures were responsible, directly or indirectly, for the attempt. Rep. Mike Collins (R-Ga.) posted to X that “Joe Biden sent the orders,” garnering over 4 million views, and later called for Biden to face charges for “inciting an assassination.”
Such rhetoric, while not directly advancing specific conspiracy theories, added thread for those already inclined to embroider the narrative.
More broadly on social media, a TikTok user who posts under the handle @theoldermillenial.1 told his 1.2 million followers: “I guess because the court cases weren’t going so well, they decided to try a different avenue. Guys, don’t forget, this is what the left is capable of.”
Shadow of Ezra, an anonymous conspiracy theorist account on X, wrote that “The Deep State tried to assassinate Donald Trump live on television,” in a post that received over a million views, according to data gathered by Junkipedia, a repository of social media content. A follow-up, describing the shooting as “the price you pay when you take down elite satanic pedophiles,” was viewed more than 2.5 million times.
The word “staged” trended on X in the hours after the shooting, as people online speculated that the scene was fabricated. Thousands of people retweeted unsubstantiated claims that the shots came from a BB gun.
In the heated aftermath, misinformation experts urged the public not to share unconfirmed information online.
“In any fast developing event, there is inevitably a high influx of false or unverified information, especially on social media,” said Graham Brookie, the Atlantic Council’s vice president for technology programs and strategy, in a post on X. “Please exercise empathy and caution as events unfold.”
But far-right channels on encrypted platforms were abuzz with a mixture of shock, rage and conspiracy theories. Triumphant slogans (“You missed!”) and calls for civil war captioned the instantly totemic image of a bloodied but defiant Trump raising a fist with the flag in the background. Without any clear word from authorities on suspects or motives, MAGA extremists embraced the idea of a politically motivated assassination attempt. Disinformation swirled as trolls looked for easy clicks by sharing uncorroborated footage and information about people they asserted had been the assailant.
