In the wake of the shooting at a Donald Trump rally, conspiracy theories on X (formerly Twitter) began to emerge, with the platform quickly highlighting topics like “#falseflag” and “staged.” Elon Musk, the owner of X, has long been a vocal advocate for free speech on social media, despite his personal views being diametrically opposed. Musk, following the shooting, expressed his full support for Trump, saying he would fully support him. According to Bloomberg, Musk recently made a generous donation to Trump’s re-election campaign. Musk has become increasingly conservative in recent times, supporting theories like the “great replacement” and promoting white pride. His endorsement joins a growing number of influential Silicon Valley figures backing Trump’s campaign.
On X, trending topics related to the shooting are dominated by short posts from users claiming the event may have been staged or faked. While there is no evidence to support these claims, the fact that these topics are trending amplifies the scope of the conspiracy theories. In contrast, other social media platforms have handled the situation more cautiously. YouTube has primarily shown news clips and search results from verified sources. Facebook has primarily driven searches toward news sites, having removed its trending topics section in 2018 following criticism of its management. Meta’s microblogging platform Threads has occasionally shown conspiratorial posts among trending topics about the incident.
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