Jason Neuman

This is the main problem with the post-truth online information ecosystem in a nutshell. A MAGA user claimed last night that Democratic politicians "Blinken, Rice Nuland and Vindman" had a conference call with Zelensky on his flight to Washington and advised him to "stand strong" and be "tough" against Trump, which directly led to the argument with Trump and Vance in the Oval Office. She cites no source or evidence for her claim and goes on to admit she was merely "speculating". Three hours later, another MAGA users rehashes that claim, saying "rumour has it" that those four Democrats did this and therefore violated the Logan Act. Again, no evidence is provided for this claim at all, but the tweet goes viral. This morning, major MAGA user amuse with 560,000 followers tweets the same claim as a news story, this time saying Obama was also directly involved and Zelensky was told to reject the minerals deal. Once again, zero source or evidence is provided by amuse, but the tweet racks up 1.7 million views. Finally this morning, Trump's envoy Richard Grenell shares the same claim, saying it's "very serious", meaning this claim has now reached the president's senior aides. At no point throughout this entire cycle has any of these users bothered to simply ask: "Is there any source or evidence for this?" And now, millions of people likely believe this is true. That Zelensky, on the advice of senior Democrats, scuppered the minerals deal and got into an argument with Trumo and Vance. There's still no source or avidence that this actually happened. But evidence no longer seems to matter in the post-truth online information ecosystem.