All the signs of being a coordinated operation
Just as Barack Obama’s US citizenship and background became a full-fledged conspiracy theory — promoted at the time by Donald Trump — Harris has also been targeted with disinformation questioning her race and legitimacy as a US citizen. Obama birther conspiracy theorists and prominent neo-Nazis, including Andrew Anglin, have questioned her eligibility to run for president, and she’s been labeled an “anchor baby.”
Then isn’t Trump an “anchor baby”? His mother was an immigrant. Or does it not count because she immigrated from Scotland?
Last night’s tweets, some of which were amplified by bots and in one case by Trump Jr., gave a new level of exposure to earlier claims propagated by fringe websites and discredited figures such as Jacob Wohl and the virulent neo-Nazi Anglin.
As documented by social media researcher Caroline Orr, Harris’s presence in the debate led to an onslaught of tweets that claimed she isn’t black, was not born in the United States, and was raised in Canada. (Harris went to high school in Canada, but otherwise lived in the US.)
A lot of suspect accounts are pushing the “Kamala Harris is not Black” narrative tonight. It’s everywhere and it has all the signs of being a coordinated/artificial operation. #DemDebate2 pic.twitter.com/DTeB2qWJnm
— Caroline Orr (@RVAwonk) June 28, 2019
Friday Trump mockingly told Putin not to interfere in the election, while Putin and Pompeo smirked. Haha, so funny.
“Psst! Obama’s too black.”
“Psst! Harris isn’t black enough.”
Whatever works, I guess.
Ben, plenty of whackaloons said Obama wasn’t black enough, too. We’ll see if it works any better against Harris.