US: get ready for the surge
A Trump victory was always going to be bad news for facts.
But after even a glance at his first nominees for key government positions it's hard not to conclude that the misinformers will be in charge. So far we have:
Pete Hegseth (Defense), who previously suggested Democrats made up the Omicron variant to help them in the mid-term elections.
Marco Rubio (SecState), who has defended right-wing influencers taking money from Russian sources to spread disinformation, calling them "victims".
Matt Gaetz (Attorney General) who has backed up Trump’s false claims about gender-affirming surgery in schools.
Doug Collins (Veterans) who rejects the scientific consensus on manmade climate change.
And then there's Robert F Kennedy Jr (Health) who Trump has said can "make America healthy again". RFK Jr is chairman of antivax group Children’s Health Defense and spreader of significant misinformation around HIV, COVID-19 vaccines, ethnic targeting of vaccines, false claims linking vaccines and autism, and misleading claims about fluoride in water.
There is an understandable focus on what impacts such views could have on US healthcare and its public health response should there be, say, another pandemic, or even just large outbreaks of common diseases such as measles or polio.
But many misinformation watchers (including this one) are also worried about another threat: a surge of contagious misinformation from the US spreading around the world.
Don't think the rest of the world should be worried?
It's worth noting a 2021 YouGov-Cambridge poll of 26,276 adults in 24 countries that demonstrates fake news is very much a global problem.
For example, 49% of respondents in South Africa and 41% in France agreed that "The truth about the harmful effects of vaccines is deliberately hidden from the public" and 32% of respondents in India and 26% in Brazil said it was true that "The idea of manmade global warming is a hoax that was invented to deceive people" (the US came in at 20%).
As for the UK, in the same poll 16% of British respondents agreed "Humans have made contact with aliens and this fact has been deliberately hidden from the public" so perhaps we Brits shouldn't look too smug.
Laughable? Perhaps, if it wasn't for the scientific consensus that believing in one conspiracy theory means you are more likely to believe in another. We don't know why exactly, but we do know being in an emotional state makes you more vulnerable to misinformation attacks. This is something misinformers are skilled at exploiting through use of emotive language and framing designed to make you angry, anxious, or afraid.
Believe enough conspiracies and eventually you will fall for one (about vaccines, medicines, pandemics, the environment, climate change) that negatively impacts your health, your safety, or the health and safety of those around you.
Ultimately we don't know if Trump's picks will be approved. Some may not be. But what matters is he has a type: people who generate or share misinformation.
That makes anyone concerned with fighting misinformation nervous. Before his inauguration in January, before even a single policy is enacted, Trump and his team are going to be pumping a fresh dose of misinformation virus into the collective global bloodstream. Helped, in no small way, by compliant sections of the press and platforms such as X, which Elon Musk (Government Efficiency) has turned into the perfect misinformation virus delivery system.
So what should we do?
Start preparing for a major surge of fake news emanating from the US that will embolden misinformers around the world, that will be jumped on by fringe (and not so fringe) political figures in other countries eager to share it wherever it fits their agenda.
Not just communications professionals but journalists, scientists, and senior leaders at all organisations need to start planning what they will do before the tide of US misinformation starts lapping at our shores.