An analysis of Breitbart News tweets — and quote tweets of their tweets — illustrates how politically-partisan media contribute to the spread of misleading stories on social media.
By the University of Washington’s Center for an Informed Public
In mid-June, our research team published a paper in the Journal of Quantitative Description: Digital Media introducing a curated dataset of tweets related to “misinformation stories” about the 2020 U.S. election. These stories were initially identified in “real-time” by researchers with the Election Integrity Partnership, a collaborative, rapid-response project that in 2020 included more than 100 researchers across four organizations (Stanford Internet Observatory, the University of Washington’s Center for an Informed Public, the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensics Research Lab, and Graphika). Subsequently, UW researchers curated a comprehensive, low-noise sample of tweets for each story and identified a subset of (307) stories featuring false, misleading, exaggerated, or unsubstantiated claims that functioned to sow doubt in election procedures and/or results. The resulting dataset includes approximately 50 million tweets. We plan to make this dataset available to qualified research teams, via an application process, as early as September 2022.
In the paper introducing this dataset, “Repeat spreaders and election delegitimization: A comprehensive dataset of misinformation tweets from the 2020 U.S. elections,” we conducted several empirical analyses of these “sows doubt” stories and tweets. One of those analyses listed the accounts that were repeatedly influential (>1,000 retweets) in the development and spread of those misleading stories. Among other accounts, @BreitbartNews appeared on that list. Here, we provide a list of the specific @BreibartNews’ tweets that appeared in this dataset, along with necessary context for understanding how these tweets contributed to misleading stories that sowed doubt in the 2020 U.S. election — in part, because it’s such an interesting case and illustrates the ways in which news organizations can contribute to the spread of these misleading stories, in some cases without making explicitly false or falsifiable claims.
Our team curated this dataset by identifying specific keyword terms that were associated with the spread of these misleading stories, and then identifying collected tweets that contained these keyword terms. This means we did not manually check each of the 50 million tweets to see if/how they were related to each story. Each “story” contains different kinds of tweets, including tweets that make verifiably false claims, speculative tweets, factual tweets that may create false impressions among audiences, and even tweets that correct false claims. There are also likely to be small numbers of tweets — what we call “noise” — that are unrelated to the stories, but were accidentally picked up because they used similar terms. We explain our approach in detail in the paper, writing:
“Even within stories that were clearly false or misleading, there are tweets linked to those stories in ElectionMisinfo2020 that are not themselves false, misleading, or clearly sowing doubt in the election. This is because the production and spread of misleading content takes place through a range of discursive strategies. Some tweets in these misleading stories are explicitly false. Others are misleading, but not false — either because they made no claims of fact, perhaps by framing a false statement as a question, or because they simply frame true claims in a misleading way. There are also tweets that function to spread a false or misleading story, but are themselves unambiguously true, for example through quotations of others who have made false claims. Finally, our dataset also includes explicit corrections of false claims. We argue that all of these discursive strategies are important parts of the misinformation story, and so include them in ElectionMisinfo2020.” (Repeat Spreaders and Election Delegitimization, p 17-18)
The false narrative of election fraud in 2020 took shape, not as a single cohesive theory, but through numerous distinct false, misleading, exaggerated, and/or unsubstantiated claims. In the lead up to the election, pro-Trump influencers in media and politics repeatedly pushed stories highlighting perceived issues with mail-in voting. Some of these claims were outright false. Others built false narratives of voter fraud around pieces of truth. For example, in late September (2020) a false narrative formed around a photo, claiming that thousands of ballots in Sonoma County, California had been discarded in the trash, and suggesting that the mail-in ballot process couldn’t be trusted. In actuality the “ballots” were ballot envelopes from 2018 being recycled according to election guidelines. In other cases, the claims highlighted real issues (e.g., stolen or discarded ballots), but omitted important context and created a distorted view of the impact of these issues (i.e., suggesting that these isolated incidents would have had an effect on results) and/or falsely attributed their cause (i.e., implying or outright claiming that the issues indicated voter fraud).
On and after election day, a series of false, misleading, and/or unsubstantiated claims emerged — from false accusations that Sharpie pens were given to Trump voters in Maricopa County, Arizona to invalidate their votes to allegations that large numbers of dead people had voted to claims that voting machines were switching votes en masse from Trump to Biden. These claims took shape through a collaboration of everyday Trump supporters and “influencers” in media and politics who helped draw attention to disparate claims and synthesize them into broader narratives of voter fraud.
Some influencers in media and politics often hedged their claims with what we call “expressed uncertainty” — for example using speculative, leading-question language to surface claims (i.e., by “just asking questions”) or using “attribution shields” that enabled them to share the claims with their audiences, while attributing them to another source thereby shielding themselves from culpability. In other cases, savvier communicators would post superficially true claims about voting issues, but without important context — for example about the limited impact of the issue or the fact that it was unlikely to be related to fraud. Others in their audiences would then pick up those claims and add explicit (and often false) accusations of election fraud. As we demonstrate here, @BreitbartNews often employed these techniques, which allowed them to contribute to the spread of these misleading stories, but often without making explicitly false or falsifiable claims.
Below we list the 17 tweets posted by @BreitbartNews that appear in our ElectionsMisinfo2020 dataset in association with misleading stories that sowed doubt in election procedures and/or results and were retweeted more than 1000 times. We include explanations for 1) how these tweets ended up in our data set; and 2) how they contributed to the false, misleading, exaggerated, or unsubstantiated stories.
The “Dead Voters” Narrative
One of the most prominent false narratives about the 2020 U.S. election alleged that large numbers of dead people had voted as part of a voter fraud scheme. The “dead voters” conspiracy theory was noted in recent hearings of the U.S. House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6 Attack on the U.S. Capitol as an example of a false narrative that fed into the “Big Lie,” and was used as rationale for illegal attempts to undermine the election results. This narrative took shape through a number of distinct claims — some true, some false — that were woven together to give a false impression.
Through their Twitter account, @BreitbartNews repeatedly posted content that contributed to the false narrative that large numbers of dead people had voted, including eight original tweets that were retweeted more than 1,000 times (in our data).
@BreitbartNews first mentioned the potential participation of “dead voters” in a tweet posted on September 19, 2020, relaying information from a report by a conservative legal group that claimed there were 350,000 dead people on voting rolls across the country. Following the methodological approach outlined in our paper, this tweet was identified as part of the “dead voters” story due to the inclusion of “dead voters” in the text. Like most of their “original” tweets, this one contained a link to a story hosted on their website.
[Tweet ID: 1307464621801046022]
This tweet lacked important, necessary context (that voting rolls are continually being updated to remove people who have died and that voter fraud in the name of dead voters is extremely rare) and created a false impression that large numbers of “dead people” (350,000) could be casting votes. Additionally, this tweet was posted during a time when there was a concerted effort to undermine trust in election procedures (and particularly the mail-in voting process), and this tweet fed into that larger narrative. To understand how @BreitbartNews’ audiences interpreted this tweet with that subtext in mind, we can look to some of the quote tweets:
[The following are quote tweets of @BreitbartNews’ Tweet, ID = 1307464621801046022.]
- Tweet: REPORT VOTER FRAUD. CHECK THE RECORDS AND REPORT ANY FRAUD IMMEDIATELY #Voterfraud #VoterID
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: Nothing to see here. Move along
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: Lemme Guess… ALL DEMOCRATS??? #trumparmy🇺🇸 <@mentions>
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: Check on all those in states from the governors who aborted their elderly! This is an election year. They may have needed the names to vote democrat.
<Quoted Tweet>
[Research note: We selected the quote tweets within this article from 1) a list of the top-20 most-retweeted quote tweets and 2) one list of 20 random quote tweets for each highly-retweeted @BreitbartNews tweet in our misinformation story-related data subsets. For each case, there are many more (dozens to 100s) of similar quote tweets that we left off in the interest of space.]
These quote tweets demonstrate that, for at least some of @BreitbartNews’ audience, the original post was interpreted as evidence to support a false meta-narrative of widespread voter fraud perpetrated by Democrats.
On October 5, @BreitbartNews shared the following tweet, highlighting a case where a man was charged for requesting a ballot for his deceased wife. This tweet includes a photograph of a Black man (notably, a very different visual than they use for all the other tweets from @BreitbartNews in our dataset) and the title of the article, visibly embedded in the tweet, leads with the assertion that the man was a Democrat.
[Tweet ID: 1313071866546917376]
[Research note: This tweet appears in our “dead voters” dataset due to the inclusion of “voter” and “deceased.” Though the tweet currently displays 625 retweets, that number is lower than the total number due to account suspensions and tweet deletions. Our real-time collection captured 1,162 retweets. This is true of many of the tweets in our dataset — that our retweet and quote tweet counts are higher than the count that are currently displayed.]
This tweet is technically correct. And Breitbart does include in the accompanying article important context provided by local election officials that note that voter fraud is very rare and that the arrest is a signal that checks for fraud are working. However, the tweet itself does not contain that context (and most viewers will never see the accompanying article). As such, the tweet functions as part of a larger pattern — by highlighting real issues with voting that distort perceptions of how common and impactful the issues are — to feed the false narrative of widespread, Democrat-led election fraud. Quote tweets demonstrate this effect:
[The following are quote tweets of @BreitbartNews’ Tweet, ID = 1313071866546917376.]
- Tweet: I’ll say it again: Get out and VOTE in person election day. This is one person, but MANY others like him. And this is just one arm of the voter fraud octopus. Only in OVERWHELMING NUMBERS in person can we defeat the fraud.
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: @DNC filled with cheaters liars and pervs
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: Leftists: Voter fraud is just an idea.
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: @realDonaldTrump Surprise! Surprise! President Trump called this, he said this would happen all over America!
<Quoted Tweet>
As the election neared, on October 30, @BreitbartNews tweeted about potential dead voters again, this time asserting that investigators had “uncovered a plan to register dozens of deceased individuals as Democrat voters.” Again, though accurate in a narrow sense, the tweet leaves out important context — that the origins of the plan were unknown and that the registrations were not used to request mail-in ballots or to vote.
[Tweet ID: 1322356520286359552]
[Research note: This tweet was included in our data due to the terms “deceased” and “voters.” Though this tweet currently displays 770 retweets, our real-time collection captured 1,467.]
This story circulated widely through many media outlets — and tweets from several other media outlets, including CNN, appear in our data and are included in the “dead voters” story. However, while @CNN’s tweet provided additional context (“though the motive is not clear”), @BreitbartNews’ tweet instead stressed that the voters were registered as “Democrat voters,” suggesting that this was part of a Democrat-led strategy. Quote tweets of @BreitbartNews’s tweet suggest that many of their followers caught that implication, passing along the news as another example of Democrat voter fraud.
[The following are quote tweets of @BreitbartNews’ Tweet, ID = 1322356520286359552.]
- Tweet: Criminal cheating democrats.
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: Democrat Corruption
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: Registering the dead as Dem voters is a new twist. In Chicago, they’ve been allowing the dead (never removed from voter rolls) to continue to vote from the ‘great beyond’. You’d be dead wrong if you think this hasn’t happened.
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: More #DemocratElectionFraud
These #ElectionFraud stories are numerous and all over the country
They can’t win honesty so they have to try and steal the Election!
<Quoted Tweet>
In the days following the election, @BreitbartNews picked up the dead voters thread again, posting the following tweet twice, once in the morning of November 6 and again the next morning. The tweet is superficially true, noting that a lawsuit was filed claiming that 21,000 dead people were on the voter rolls in Pennsylvania. The underlying claim has been labeled “misleading” by FactCheck.org, who noted that the number was disputed, that clearing voting rolls of dead people is a constant process, and that, though some people do indeed die between the times they register to vote and election day, very few votes are cast by others in the names of dead people.
[Tweet ID: 1324704470492696582]
[Tweet ID: 1325051010499424259]
[Research Note: These tweets were identified as part of the “dead voters” story due to the inclusion of “dead people” and “voter” in the text.]
At the time that these tweets were posted, in the days immediately after the election, the “dead voters” narrative was being developed and amplified as an explanation for why Trump had lost the election and was becoming a core part of the false meta-narrative of massive voter fraud by Democrats. Regardless of the accuracy of their tweet or the underlying claims, these tweets from @BreitbartNews helped to advance that false narrative, drawing attention to efforts by conservative and Trump-supporting organizations to use the legal system to challenge the results.
Once again, we can look to the quote tweets of these tweets to see how audiences were interpreting this information and amplifying it as evidence of purported voter fraud. Below, we include some example quote tweets (all among the top-20 most retweeted quoted tweets for each):
[The following are quote tweets of @BreitbartNews’ Tweets, ID = 1324704470492696582 and 1325051010499424259.]
- Tweet: Looks like 21k dead people voted in Pennsylvania…
But according to the mainstream media, there is no evidence of fraud, so there’s still nothing to see here. Keep circulating shit (translated)
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: At least 21,000 dead helped Biden “turn around” in Pennsylvania. ALL THE BIG MEDIA are in collusion and insist on lying that there is not even a hint of fraud. (translated)
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: EVIDENCE
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: How many dead people voted in Georgia’s election? How many folks illegally dumped batches of absentee ballots in drop boxes? The videos of drop boxes need to be made available to the public
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: Take a wild guess for who they all voted for, folks!
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: That was a given! They were all Democrats as well huh.
<Quoted Tweet>
The next day, @BreitbartNews posted another tweet and article noting that “a dead woman did in fact vote in Pennsylvania.” This tweet appears in our “dead voters” data because its text included “dead woman” and “vote.” The woman, who intended to vote for Trump, had passed away between the time when she had requested a mail-in ballot and the time when it was filled out — likely by a family member. Interestingly, in this case, Breitbart’s headline does not mention that the family indicated the woman intended to vote for Donald Trump. This story appears in a fact-checking article by USA Today, which features a statement by an election expert explaining that “Deceased voter fraud claims often ‘overexaggerated and not contextualized.’”
[Tweet ID: 1325578904480976900]
The tweet reads as a counter-argument to rebuttals of the “dead voters” narrative, providing evidence that at least one vote could be attributed to a dead person — with the implication that if there is one vote from a dead person, then there could be more. However, the tweet omits important context, for example that the vote was likely submitted by family members in support of Donald Trump or that experts agree that voter fraud via deceased voters is extremely rare. Perhaps not surprisingly, many of the people who engaged with @BreitbartNews’ tweet assumed that the woman was a Democrat and connected this claim to the larger “election fraud” narrative:
[The following are quote tweets of @BreitbartNews’ Tweet, ID = 1325578904480976900.]
- Tweet: I’m announcing this right now. When I die, I will never vote democrat. We should all consider putting this in our Last Will & Testaments. <Quoted Tweet>
- Tweet: Let me guess..🤔🤔🤔she voted democrat!!
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: Shocker huh Democrats
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: Like cockroaches, when you see one there are thousands more hiding!
<Quoted Tweet>
Again, though @BreitbartNews’ tweet was superficially true, it was crafted in a way that created a false impression — suggesting to its audiences that the story provided evidence both for the false narrative that large numbers of dead people had voted and for the false meta-narrative of systematic voter fraud in support of Democrats.
On November 10, @BreitbartNews tweeted again about potential dead voters, this time asserting that “Pennsylvania auditors had alerted officials of possible dead people … on the state’s voter rolls … but the warnings went unacknowledged.” This tweet was included in our “dead voters” story due to the inclusion of “dead people” and “voter” in the text. It again highlights perceived vulnerabilities related to the election, providing additional “evidence” for those theorizing that large numbers of votes had been made in the names of dead people. It also suggests that election officials had not done their due diligence in expunging dead people from voting rolls, implying that election officials were negligent — or worse.
[Tweet ID: 1326374452645519360]
Again, quote tweets reveal how audiences interpreted @BreitbartNews’ tweet, using the claims as evidence to support a growing conspiracy theory alleging election fraud by Democrats, and connecting them to the emerging “StopTheSteal” movement:
[The following are quote tweets of @BreitbartNews’ Tweet, ID = 1326374452645519360.]
- Tweet: Remember . .
Stacey Abrams and her group called Fair Fight Action ..
And Other Democrat Orgs had lawyers fight Against Cleaning up Voter Rolls . .
Claiming Voter Suppression . .
<Quoted tweet>- Tweet: @TuckerCarlson @newsmax @TheJusticeDept Who ignored the #VoterFraud ??? #Pennsylvania @SandraSmithFox @TeamCavuto @BretBaier #WednesdayWisdom Watch #Newsmax ‼️‼️#bidencheated
<Quoted tweet>- Tweet: Because they are dead dems
<Quoted tweet>- Tweet: <@MentionedUser> You mean, election officials ignored fraud and irregularities
👇👇
<Quoted tweet>- Tweet: #stopthesteal
<Quoted tweet>
The final “dead voters” tweet from @BreitbartNews (that we captured in our data collection) was posted on November 13, and reporting on a lawsuit by the conservative organization, True the Vote, alleging that dead people (and felons) had voted. The lawsuit was later withdrawn, with Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel remarking, “This case was clearly designed to spread misinformation about the security and integrity of Michigan elections.”
[Tweet ID: 1327394269162823681]
[Research note: This tweet was picked up in our “dead voters” data due to inclusion of “dead people” and “voted.” Though this tweet currently displays 576 retweets, our real-time collection captured 1,086.]
In this misleading tweet, @BreitbartNews uses an attribution shield to pass along claims from True the Vote — again feeding the false narrative that large numbers of dead people had voted. And again, quote tweets of this tweet demonstrate that @BreitbartNews’ audiences interpreted the content as more evidence for false claims of election fraud — as well as fuel for criticism of Governor Whitmer:
[The following are quote tweets of @BreitbartNews’ Tweet, ID = 1327394269162823681.]
- Tweet: You mean to tell me that Gov Glaze Face Twitmer cheated?https://t.co/AgxONOupsJ
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: Suing Gretchen Whitmer. Music to my ears.https://t.co/OR4V2JbMR5
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: Hahahaha SHES a degenerate WITCH @GovWhitmer
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: Where are the militia boys now??🔴🔴🔴
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: WAKE UP AMERICA!
DemonRats hate Trump more than they love our country! TRAITORS.
<Quoted Tweet>
As these examples demonstrate, the “dead voters” narrative took shape through a number of distinct “incidents” of viral claims — some true, some false — about the potential or actuality of ballots being cast in the names of deceased individuals. Together these claims created a false impression that large numbers of dead people had voted and fed false conspiracy theories that these “dead voters” were part of a widespread, systematic voter fraud effort led by Democrats. Throughout the pre- and post-election period, @BreitbartNews repeatedly shared content that spread widely (receiving thousands of retweets), contributing to these false impressions and providing “evidence” for false conspiracy theories.
Technical “Glitches” and the “Dominion Voting Machines” Narrative
In the aftermath of the election, as Trump and his supporters searched for evidence to support theories of election fraud, some identified and amplified stories about issues — or “glitches” — with vote counting and reporting, especially in swing states. One particularly salient case centered on Antrim County, Michigan, where human error related to a software update led to a miscount that incorrectly indicated a Biden victory on the morning of November 4. The error was identified and corrected later that day, but soon became a focal point of speculation. Later, pro-Trump influencers and audiences would home in on Dominion Voting Systems machines used in Antrim County and in many voting districts around the country, eventually developing into a false conspiracy theory that Dominion voting machines and/or the Smartmatic software company (that provided software for those machines) had systematically switched votes from Trump to Biden in key swing states as part of an elaborate election fraud scheme. This theory spread widely, including through conservative and pro-Trump media outlets. Eventually Dominion Voting Systems sued several of the media outlets and public figures that spread these false theories, claiming $1.6 billion in damages.
In the days following the election, @BreitbartNews posted five highly-retweeted (>1,000) tweets that contributed to the development and spread of the Dominion/Smartmatic conspiracy theory. They posted their first highly-retweeted tweet (below) about a “glitch” in the morning of November 7. This tweet was picked up in our “technology/Dominion” dataset due to the inclusion of the terms “glitch” and “votes.”
[IMAGE 9: Tweet ID: 1325082474557345795]
The tweet related a true story of a Republican candidate in a county-level election who had initially conceded. A local clerk caught the error and corrected it the next day. In another year, this local interest story may not have received much attention beyond local media. But in the days after the 2020 election, right wing media had begun to repeatedly highlight stories about “glitches” — often (as in this case) repurposing reporting from local media to draw attention to these issues from large, national audiences. Quote tweets reveal those audiences interpreting @BreitbartNews’ tweet as part of a broader pattern of voting machine and voting software issues, leveraging the story to undermine confidence in the election results, and speculating about how this glitch may have been part of a Democrat-led voter fraud scheme:
[The following are quote tweets of @BreitbartNews’ Tweet, ID = 1325082474557345795.]
- Tweet: A computer glitch. Soooooo. Who ha been creating and who has been fixing it? And what does that mean for the Presidential Elections?<Quoted Tweet>
- Tweet: When Democrats get caught cheating… this can happen.
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: Seriously!!! this is insane. The whole election is a complete and utter joke. Unbelievable!!!! Where is the media reporting on this.
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: The #significance of this is: The programs that were nefariously employed to manipulate vote counts by shifting Trump votes over to Biden – Did the SAME up and down the entire ballot – causing Republicans that “won” to come out the losers.
– God Help Us.
<Quoted Tweet>
Two hours later, @BreitbartNews posted a related tweet relaying a statement from a Trump-supporting lawyer suggesting that Trump’s campaign lawyers should request recounts in other areas that used the same vote-counting software as Antrim County.
[Tweet ID: 1325113804666056704]
[Research note: This tweet was identified as part of the “technology/Dominion” story due to the inclusion of the terms “Antrim” and “software.” Though this tweet currently displays 637 retweets, our real-time collection captured 1,187 total tweets.]
Though superficially true (Jay Sekulow did make this statement), the tweet provided a platform for a false insinuation — that the isolated Antrim County issue (where a vote-counting issue had been caused by a clerk failing to properly update a software system) may indicate other results are untrustworthy. This speculative statement used the issues in Antrim County to sow doubt in election results more broadly. It also focused attention on the voting software (running on Dominion Voting Systems machines) which soon became a central element in emerging conspiracy theories of election fraud. The quote tweets, again, show how this tweet fed into the then unsubstantiated (and ultimately false) claims:
[The following are quote tweets of @BreitbartNews’ Tweet, ID = 1325113804666056704.]
- Tweet: You’re damn fuching right, attention lying and cheating snowflakes…
🖕#BidensNotMyPresident #ElectionIntegrity
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: The software used to tabulate ballots in Michigan caused 6KRepublican votes counted as Democrat. 47 counties use same Avid software, 60% owned by Richard C. Blum. Diane Feinstein’s husband. Pelosi AND Blum/Feinstein owners in Dominion Voting Systems (Avid).Georgia uses the same.
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: Don’t you believe Governor Whitmer will never have a fair recount! Do you really think after all the damages Whitmer caused Michigans so much grief, all the protests, do you really think ONE person would vote for a democrat? Me either @realDonaldTrump @DonaldJTrumpJr @VP
<Quoted Tweet>
Less than two hours later, @BreitbartNews posted another tweet about voting software, this time highlighting that two counties in Georgia, where the results were still uncertain, used the same electronic voting software as the county in Michigan (Antrim) that had experienced “glitches.”
[Tweet ID: 1325140745746067457]
[Research note: This tweet was included in our “technology/Dominion” story due to the terms “software” and “glitches.” Though this tweet currently displays 694 retweets, our real-time collection captured 1,182 total tweets]
The tweet used a specious association to feed doubt in the forthcoming election results in Georgia, where Biden would eventually be determined to be the winner.
[The following are quote tweets of @BreitbartNews’ Tweet, ID = 1325140745746067457.]
- Tweet: No, you don’t say! #NotOurPresident
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: This was intentionally coded malfeasance. Calling them “glitches” suggests it was accidental. When software glitches actually happen, all are affected. When malware is run, it serves a purpose, and this “glitch” stole votes!
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: #bidenharis2020 your gunna break when Trump wins in court
<Quoted Tweet>
Tweet: #GlitchGate Funny how all those ‘Glitches’ repeatedly swing one way. #HoldTheLine
<Quoted Tweet>
These quote tweets demonstrate how the repeated stories about a small number of “glitches” contributed to a false sense among Trump-supporting audiences that the election results could not be trusted and fed growing conspiracy theories about voting software and voting machines. Later that night, @BreitbartNews would report that another “glitch” had delayed the counting of votes.
[Tweet ID: 1325289310996717569]
[Research note: This tweet was picked up as part of our “technology/Dominion” dataset due to the terms, “glitch” and “votes.”]
The repeated focus on “glitches” — often without important context that explained that these issues were isolated, were caught and rectified by procedures in place to ensure accurate results, and had not affected final results — contributed to a false impression that election processes and election results were untrustworthy. And once again, quote tweets of @BreitbartNews’ tweet demonstrate how the audiences were misinterpreting these tweets, often as evidence for false theories of election fraud:
[The following are quote tweets of @BreitbartNews’ Tweet, ID = 1325289310996717569.]
- Tweet (by @EricTrump): Software from hell! There needs to be a manual recount of every ballot in this country right now!
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: Election officials estimate that roughly 80,000 absentee ballots were impacted by this glitch, yet decided to push the impacted votes through, knowing some of the votes would likely change.
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: I testified in PA, TX, SC and worked with the states of FL and GA on the threat of “digital voting machines” – while my focus was foreign hacking, it is clear that the hacking in this case came from within…this MUST be examined – the machines in GA and MI must be checked
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: Glitch huh? Why do these “glitches” always favor Democrats?
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: Not a “glitch”, but rather 100 lines of code programmed to steal an election. #CoupdEtat
<Quoted Tweet>
Interestingly, in this case, we can see pro-Trump influencers, including Trump’s son @EricTrump in the top tweet here (retweeted 28,442 times), pick up and amplify @BreitbartNews’ tweet to support their claims that the results of the elections could not be trusted.
About a week later, @BreitbartNews posted another highly shared tweet related to this large narrative, this time calling out Dominion voting machines by name and noting that the Trump campaign had filed a lawsuit against the company.
[Tweet ID: 1327230311843983361]
[Research note: This tweet ended up in our “technology/Dominion” story due to the “Dominion” and “voting” terms. Though this tweet currently displays 592 retweets, our real-time collection captured 1,105 total tweets]
This tweet reveals the culmination of the early glitch amplification into a well-formed (false) conspiracy theory, mobilized by the Trump campaign within a lawsuit (later withdrawn), about Dominion voting machines. The Trump campaign repeatedly attempted to use the courts to give credence to their false allegations, and attempted to use the false/misleading claims to challenge election results. In this tweet, once again, @BreitbartNews contributes to the spread of this false conspiracy theory without making an explicitly false statement, but instead by giving a platform and visibility to false allegations by others.
[The following are quote tweets of @BreitbartNews’ Tweet, ID = 1327230311843983361.]
- Tweet: woop woop!
Can you feel it?
Can you smell it in the air!
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: Let’s get this done and END #VoterFraud
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: “Death shall have No Dominion”
Regardless they will pay for this heinous act.
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: #stopthesteal #trump #maga2020 #trumppence #teamtrump #trumpsaveamerica #thisisbiblical #michigan
🙏Look for this decision in Michigan by a Judge today! This is a massive Lawsuit!
<Quoted Tweet>
These example quote tweets reveal a couple of interesting dynamics: first, how the false claims about Dominion voting machines were feeding a sense of outrage among Trump’s supporters; and second, how Trump’s lawsuits gave hope to at least some of his followers that the results of the election would be overturned in his favor.
The false conspiracy theory about Dominion voting machines systematically switching votes from Trump to Biden became a central component of the Big Lie. These highly-retweeted tweets from @BreitbartNews provide an illuminating window into how early stories and repeated stories about software “glitches” planted the seeds that soon grew into a false conspiracy theory of election fraud — and how that conspiracy theory was picked up by the Trump campaign and eventually used to challenge the results of the election (and to motivate the multi-faceted events of January 6).
Amplifying Issues With Voting Procedures While Omitting Key Context
In the lead up to the election, @BreitbartNews participated in the spread of several stories that highlighted issues with the election process, especially mail-in voting, and created a false sense that election procedures could not be trusted. Their tweets linked to stories posted on Breitbart’s website, often picked up and in large parts repurposed from local media, and then spread to a Breitbart’s broader audience. Though the original stories (and to some extent, Breitbart’s remixed versions) typically included important context, those details were consistently missing from @BreitbartNews’ tweets. This repeated amplification of small issues without key context (e.g., about the limited impact of the problem or the fact that it had been corrected) created a false sense that voting irregularities were widespread. In many cases, audiences picked up these claims within the “voter fraud” frame.
Our analyses identified three of @BreitbartNews’ tweets that were highly influential (retweeted >1,000 times) in distinct, but related stories about voting issues. The first, posted in the morning of September 16, noted that 1,600 ballots from a primary election had been discovered in a “mislabeled” bin.
[Tweet ID: 1306207641862111232]
[Research note: The tweet was determined to be part of our “ballots in a mislabeled bin” story due to inclusion of the terms “New Jersey” and “bin” in the text. Though this tweet currently displays 772 retweets, our real-time collection captured 1,474. ]
The tweet (which is markedly short of Twitter’s 280 character limit) failed to include important context that the issue had been corrected and that it had not impacted the results of any races. As the tweet and the broader story spread online, many audience members picked up on the underlying subtext — i.e., that the mail-in voting process was not trustworthy. Some interpreted the story as evidence of a voter scheme. Quote tweets of @BreitbartNews’ original tweet demonstrate this dynamic:
[The following are quote tweets of @BreitbartNews’ Tweet, ID = 1306207641862111232.]
- Tweet: Just laying the groundwork for when they need to “find” votes in November. This is going to be a total disaster.
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: and we’re supposed to trust mail-in ballots? ITN!!!
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: #mailinballots #MailInVoterFraud #NewJersey
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: Oh, but mail in ballots are going to be fabulous…. 🙄
<Quoted Tweet>
A second tweet, posted later that same day, noted that 400 ballots printed for troops overseas had a misprint that falsely identified Trump’s running mate. Local media initially published this story, stressing that few of the ballots had actually been mailed out, that the issue was identified quickly and corrected, and that in the rare case that someone returned one of these ballots, their vote for Trump would still count. There was no evidence that this was an intentional error. However, as this story spread online, it was often framed and/or interpreted in misleading ways.
[Tweet ID: 1306390980225110016]
[Research note: Our analysis identified this tweet as part of the “Michigan Misprints for Troops” story because the article URL was identified during the real-time analysis as being connected to that story. Though this tweet currently displays 570 retweets, our real-time collection captured 1,094.]
In their tweet about the incident, @BreitbartNews’ tweet left out the important context that was stressed in the original article and instead used their limited character count to specifically lay the blame for the error on Jocelyn Benson (Michigan’s Secretary of State) and call attention to her affiliations with the Democratic Party, noting that she had endorsed Joe Biden and spoke at the Democratic National Convention. Not surprisingly, many within @BreitbartNews’ audiences interpreted this tweet to suggest that this incident was evidence of intentional election interference. Quote tweets, again, demonstrate this dynamic:
[The following are quote tweets of @BreitbartNews’ Tweet, ID = 1306390980225110016.]
- Tweet: RT @donaldrusso994: This is criminal. It was not an error
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: More election interference.
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: She didn’t misprint anything. A misprint is a mistake. What she did was intentional and that’s a crime, not a misprint.
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: More democrat election interference!
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: Oopsy. Guess THOSE ballots won’t count now, right? You ppl are so terribly transparent…..
<Quoted Tweet>
Near the end of September, @BreitbartNews posted another tweet relaying issues with the mail-in voting process, this time highlighting a story about military ballots that had been found, discarded, in a dumpster. In this case, @BreitbartNews’ coverage featured a statement from a U.S. attorney stressing that all of the ballots had been cast for Trump — which seemed to suggest the possibility of intentional sabotage. The tweet omitted the fact that the number of ballots was quite small (9). Later, it was learned that the ballots had been discarded (most likely accidentally) by an inexperienced election worker who had just started on the job two days before, and officials would correct the original statement, clarifying that while seven of nine ballots were found to have been cast for Trump, the other two were unopened and their preferred candidate unknown. Some former Justice Department officials criticized the original statement, explaining that it was “bizarre and disturbing” that the U.S. Attorney would report that the ballots had been cast for Trump.
[Tweet ID: 1309194936420634628]
[Research note: This tweet was picked up as part of our “PA discarded ballots” story due to the inclusion of “ballots,” “discarded,” and “Pennsylvania.”]
Not surprising considering that the original statement and @BreitbartNews’ tweet relayed the story with false and misleading emphasis that the ballots all been cast for Trump, pro-Trump, and conservative audiences inferred this tweet as more evidence that Democrats were “cheating”:
[The following are quote tweets of @BreitbartNews’ Tweet, ID = 1309194936420634628.]
- Tweet: The #Democrats are straight up cheating with mail in votes. @realDonaldTrump has to bin them all and demand an in-person election to ensure a result that won’t spark civil war. If you can have #BlackLivesMatter street parties – you can show up at the polling booth.
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: The election should be suspended until we have a national voter id law.
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: Dam fkn Dems!!!!🤬
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: #VoteInPerson #VoterFraudIsReal
<Quoted Tweet>- Tweet: The leftest cheating has begun.
<Quoted Tweet>
Taken together, these three tweets — and the broader stories they helped to produce and amplify — demonstrate a pattern of highlighting small issues with the voting process, omitting or obscuring important context, and stressing specific aspects of the story to promote speculation about Democratic voter fraud. The repetition of these claims led to a false impression that issues were widespread and could impact election results. The quote tweets presented here demonstrate how @BreitbartNews’ audiences interpreted their content within a broader conversation about the alleged vulnerability of mail-in voting and false claims of systematic election fraud.
Nevada Whistleblower
Our final example is a @BreitbartNews tweet posted on November 8, relaying a story from Fox News about an election worker in Nevada who claimed to have witnessed illegitimate ballot processing. The worker swore an affidavit declaring that he had been instructed to count ballots that he perceived lacked the required signatures. The day after the story broke, the Clark County Registrar (in charge of that voting facility) responded that the worker would not have had access to the signatures records and would not have been able to determine, for example, when a signature did not match due to a recent name change. In other words, election officials explained that the worker’s claims were the result of a misunderstanding of the process and his role.
[Tweet ID: 1325563584005464064]
[Research note: This tweet was picked up as part of our “Nevada Whistleblower” story due to the inclusion of “ballots,” “discarded,” and “Pennsylvania.”]
In this case, @BreitbartNews passed along an unsubstantiated claim that contributed to broader efforts that sought to sow doubt in election results by highlighting perceived irregularities. Again, quote tweets show how audiences interpreted this tweet within that frame — feeding their false conspiracy theories of a rigged election and their false hopes that the results would be overturned:
[The following are quote tweets of @BreitbartNews’ Tweet, ID = 1309194936420634628.]
- Tweet: This is only the tip of the ice burg! Much more to come when the massive investigation begins. Understanding how cyber systems were used to advantage by some, will bring forth the truth! Stop the Steal!
<Quoted tweet>- Tweet: Learn how Nevada vote counting is fraudulent and dangerous to America
<Quoted tweet>- Tweet: THIS WILL TOTALLY REVERSE THE RESULT OF THIS ELECTION MAGGA!
<Quoted tweet>- Tweet: DONT ACCEPT THE #FRAUD #America
<Quoted tweet>
A Pattern of Feeding Misleading Stories and False Narratives
The “Big Lie” took shape not a single cohesive theory about how an election was stolen, but a series of disparate stories — assembled from false, misleading, exaggerated, and unsubstantiated claims — woven together to create a false perception of a “rigged” election. As we show here, @BreitbartNews was influential in the spread of several of these false/misleading stories, repeatedly providing raw materials that members of their audiences used to weave into false conspiracy theories of systematic voter fraud.
Breitbart may argue that most of their tweets, if evaluated outside of the relevant context, are not technically false or even falsifiable, which is both correct and perhaps the most interesting thing about their particular case — because they use very specific strategies to participate in the spread of false, misleading, speculative, and/or unsubstantiated narratives. This is not an aberration, but a pattern, which likely reflects a purposeful strategy. In fact, had they only posted tweets that fed into one or two different misleading stories, they would not have appeared in our “repeat spreaders” list. But these tweets demonstrate a pattern of repeatedly engaging in — and being influential in the spread of — many different stories that contributed to the “Big Lie,” using a set of linguistic techniques that allowed them to contribute to the spread of misinformation without having to take direct responsibility for that spread.
