Deplatforming Trump Is Already Having a Huge Impact

A new report finds election misinformation online has fallen 73 percent since the president’s ban from Twitter.

Jeff Swensen/Getty

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.

It’s been nine days of relative calm since Twitter cut off a major spigot of election misinformation from President Donald Trump’s account—setting off a chain of suspensions across Facebook, Snapchat, Twitch, and other platforms that affected the president, his allies, and others who stoked violence in the lead up to the January 6 riot at the US Capitol.

Now, a new report reveals just how consequential these platforms’ decision has been since @realDonaldTrump went quiet. Since January 8, when Twitter banned Trump, online misinformation about election fraud has plummeted 73 percent, according to research from analytics firm Zignal Labs, the Washington Post reported on Saturday. Hashtags and terms associated with the Capitol riot—including #FightforTrump, #HoldTheLine, and “March for Trump”—fell 95 percent or more.

While phrases used by believers in QAnon also dropped, mentions of QAnon and “Q” grew slightly—perhaps due to media coverage of the conspiracy’s role in Capitol riot, according to the Washington Post. 

Zignal Labs’ findings underline the central role played by Trump, his allies, and influential followers in spreading lies about the election results on social media, where eager supporters of the president retweeted his message at high rates and news media picked up each new Trump tweet as fodder for another article. Last year, Twitter tried to curb the misinformation pushed by Trump by adding notices to the president’s tweets when they violated the platform’s policies against spreading election misinformation. On other 240-character presidential missives claiming he won the election in a “landslide,” or accusing the governors of Georgia and Arizona of letting the election be “stolen,” Twitter prevented people from liking or retweeting the messages without attaching their own comment. 

Now, it looks like the social media giants have found something that actually works to stop the spread of lies—at least for now. (Facebook, which says Trump’s account is suspended “indefinitely,” has left the door open to reinstating his account after the end of his term.) While Trump has continued to release tweet-like statements through the White House Office of the Press Secretary, he has yet to acknowledge his loss of the election to President-elect Joe Biden.

THE FACTS SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES.

At least we hope they will, because that’s our approach to raising the $350,000 in online donations we need right now—during our high-stakes December fundraising push.

It’s the most important month of the year for our fundraising, with upward of 15 percent of our annual online total coming in during the final week—and there’s a lot to say about why Mother Jones’ journalism, and thus hitting that big number, matters tremendously right now.

But you told us fundraising is annoying—with the gimmicks, overwrought tone, manipulative language, and sheer volume of urgent URGENT URGENT!!! content we’re all bombarded with. It sure can be.

So we’re going to try making this as un-annoying as possible. In “Let the Facts Speak for Themselves” we give it our best shot, answering three questions that most any fundraising should try to speak to: Why us, why now, why does it matter?

The upshot? Mother Jones does journalism you don’t find elsewhere: in-depth, time-intensive, ahead-of-the-curve reporting on underreported beats. We operate on razor-thin margins in an unfathomably hard news business, and can’t afford to come up short on these online goals. And given everything, reporting like ours is vital right now.

If you can afford to part with a few bucks, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones with a much-needed year-end donation. And please do it now, while you’re thinking about it—with fewer people paying attention to the news like you are, we need everyone with us to get there.

payment methods

THE FACTS SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES.

At least we hope they will, because that’s our approach to raising the $350,000 in online donations we need right now—during our high-stakes December fundraising push.

It’s the most important month of the year for our fundraising, with upward of 15 percent of our annual online total coming in during the final week—and there’s a lot to say about why Mother Jones’ journalism, and thus hitting that big number, matters tremendously right now.

But you told us fundraising is annoying—with the gimmicks, overwrought tone, manipulative language, and sheer volume of urgent URGENT URGENT!!! content we’re all bombarded with. It sure can be.

So we’re going to try making this as un-annoying as possible. In “Let the Facts Speak for Themselves” we give it our best shot, answering three questions that most any fundraising should try to speak to: Why us, why now, why does it matter?

The upshot? Mother Jones does journalism you don’t find elsewhere: in-depth, time-intensive, ahead-of-the-curve reporting on underreported beats. We operate on razor-thin margins in an unfathomably hard news business, and can’t afford to come up short on these online goals. And given everything, reporting like ours is vital right now.

If you can afford to part with a few bucks, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones with a much-needed year-end donation. And please do it now, while you’re thinking about it—with fewer people paying attention to the news like you are, we need everyone with us to get there.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate