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Jared Gillingham

Professor Underwood

COM 468

8 December 2016

Alex Jones, Donald Trump, and Twitter: The Dangers of Fake News as Fact

Introduction

On November 27, 2016, President-elect Donald Trump tweeted, In addition to winning

the Electoral College in a landslide, I won the popular vote if you deduct the millions of people

who voted illegally. This claim was roundly debunked in political circles even before its origins

were traced back to Alex Jones (Watson). If you are anything like the average American, you get

your news online; 40% of us do (Nieva). With the multitude of outlets available to get your news

from, we are rarely disconnected from some news source. However, it is fair to say that many of

us, knowingly or not, are subjecting ourselves to numerous fake news articles. Companies like

Facebook and Google have been criticized recently for a weakness in their algorithms that does

not do enough to flag or block these fake news stories. One of the biggest creators of fake news

content is Alex Jones and his website, Infowars. Accounting for Facebook likes, Twitter

followers, and YouTube subscribers on both his personal and Infowars accounts, Jones has a

direct audience of 4.5 million, not factoring in view counts on his videos or unique website

visitors. Although there is little doubt that Jones believes the things he says on his website and

radio show, what sort of ethical dilemmas arise when a journalist purposefully spreads false

information, especially when that information is later reported as fact? In this paper, I plan to

highlight the dangers of fake news, using the aforementioned tweet in particular. Fake news is

inherently dangerous but when it is reported as fact, it sets an even more dangerous precedent.
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Context

After several hints at a possible Presidential run, Donald Trump launched his campaign

for the Republican nomination on June 16, 2015. Originally written off as a publicity stunt,

Trump quickly gained the support of the majority of Republican voters, prevailing as the Partys

nominee in May 2016. Using the slogan Make American Great Again, he rode the momentum

of his record-setting performance in the primary to a surprise win over Secretary Hillary Clinton

in the general election to become the forty-fifth President of the United States. Despite his

ultimately victorious Presidential campaign, Trump was surrounded by controversy for the

majority of it. Whether it was calling the people of Mexico who come to America rapists and

drug dealers (Schwartz), video surfacing of him bragging about being able to sexually assault

women when you are famous (Smith), or suggesting that Ted Cruzs father helped assassinate

John F. Kennedy (McCaskill), there always seemed to be a cloud of conspiracy and controversy

hanging over Trumps head. Now, even though he is the President-elect of the United States, this

cloud has not seemed to go away but instead grows bigger as he is now spreading

misinformation.

Though Alex Jones has been well known for years, with his career in radio dating back to

1996, stories circulated by himself and his website have been increasingly viewed due to this

years Presidential election. More known for his wild conspiracy theories than his journalism per

se, it is unclear whether Alex Jones considers himself a journalist in the traditional sense. He

himself has said, I dont try to come off like some stuffy journalist or analyst. I go do real

research and I dont think Im right about everything either, but I wish I was wrong about

more things. Its really upsetting to see all of my analysis, the vast majority of it, turning out to

be accurate (Coscarelli). However, it is absolutely certain that Alex Jones has the ear of the
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future President of the United States, something unprecedented especially when considering

Jones is a conspiracy theorist at best and a propagator of fake news at worst. Trump has even

gone so far as to say that Jones has an amazing reputation and when Jones said Trump called him

to thank him for the support, his campaign chose not to confirm or deny the statement

(Folkenflik). It is shocking that Donald Trump is not only willing to listen to but also accept the

things that Alex Jones and Infowars as a whole share, despite the fact there is no evidence to

prove the vast majority of stories on the site.

Potter Box Analysis

The facts of this case have been laid out but I will quickly set up the case again. The

actors in this case are President-elect Trump and Alex Jones and the stakeholders are the

American people. Jones is attempting to build his journalistic credibility and views Trump,

someone with whom he has a friendly relationship, as a good channel for getting his views to a

wider audience. Trump has already tweeted one of these false stories, saying that he would have

won the popular vote if millions had not voted illegally. If he continues to spread false stories as

fact, the American people as a whole will continue to grow skeptical of the integrity of the voting

process and may even increase tension between racial groups. Values that can be identified in

this case are honesty, integrity, respect for others, responsible citizenship, and credibility. By

tweeting information that is not accurate, President-elect Trump is lacking the honesty that we

typically expect from someone in government, much less the President. Additionally, Trump is

lacking integrity he has little to lose, as he has already been elected President. However, his

unwillingness to accept his defeat in the popular vote by attributing the gap to illegal votes

does not reflect well on his character. The gap between he and Hillary Clinton in the popular

vote has swelled to approximately 2.7 million (Revesz), which means every one of the alleged
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three million illegal voters would have voted for Secretary Clinton. The President-elect is also

showing little respect for others because others do not enjoy being lied to, especially when it is

by the person in the highest position of government. This ties in as well to responsible

citizenship because we should always check the source of our news before accepting it as true.

Taking something at face value, especially something spread by someone known for fake news

stories, and reporting that as factual information is extremely irresponsible on the part of the

President-elect. The insinuation behind illegal votes is that the votes were cast by illegal

immigrants, which is also dangerous to suggest because of already high racial tension in the

country. A tweet such as this, on top of several other questionable actions by Trump, serves no

purpose beyond further damaging his credibility among the majority of Americans.

Several different ethical values can also be applied to this Trump tweet, including the

frameworks of philosophers such as Voltaire and John Milton and the principle of utilitarianism.

Voltaire once said, I may disagree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to

say it. What he is essentially saying is that even if you disagree with someone, the right to free

speech is more important than this difference in viewpoint. Therefore, although many disagree

with what Trump tweeted and even though it is not true, he is exercising his first amendment

right and we should let him do it. Regardless of whether or not what he or anyone else has said is

false, we should not have anything that infringes upon our right to free speech. Speaking of

falsehood, John Milton created what is called the marketplace of opinion, in which where truth

and falsehood are both present, truth will always prevail. We can see that this is true for this

case; the President-elect tweeted something that may or not have been true but, when closely

examined by journalists and non-journalists alike, was proven to be false. Put in its simplest

terms, acting as a utilitarian means creating the greatest good for the greatest number of people.
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By spreading false information, whether intentionally or not, President-elect Trump is behaving

in way that is almost the exact opposite of a utilitarian. Trump has a massive following on social

media and an extremely large platform as our newest President and his tweeting of this story is

doing a disservice to the American people.

Finally, there are several loyalties that must be considered in our Potter Box analysis.

These loyalties include loyalty to society, loyalty to employer, loyalty to self, loyalty to publics

right to know, and loyalty to professional reputation. Donald Trump has a loyalty to society,

which is also his employer in a non-literal sense, to not mislead them about things such as this.

Trump also has a loyalty to himself, meaning that he should not lie to himself or fill his mind

with false information, especially in his new position as President. His failure to uphold truth as a

supreme value in this instance is a disservice both to the country that elected him but also to

himself. Furthermore, Trump has infringed on the publics right to know by reporting this false

story as some kind of fact. Also, as previously mentioned, Trump further tarnishes his reputation,

even before stepping foot in the White House as the President. This is something Trump can ill-

afford, as his favorability rating is only 50% and only 37% think the country is headed in the

right direction (Stracqualursi).

Decision and Conclusion

Ultimately, next to nothing was done on the part of Donald Trump to combat the

criticism faced for tweeting this false information. Instead, Trump and several of his constituents

have avoided answering questions about the tweet and Trump continues to be a very active force

on Twitter. In the meantime, several journalistic sources have attempted to establish the fact that

this was a lie by Trump but it remains to be seen what larger effect this may have. In my opinion,

I would absolutely expect some sort of an explanation from the President-elect but would have
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advised against composing the tweet in the first place. There is nothing to back up the fact that

three million people voted illegally in this years election and no attempt is made to verify these

claims, either by Trump or Infowars. People should always check the sources where they are

getting their news and this is especially true for someone who is a little over a month away from

becoming the President of the United States. The implications of our next President spreading

fake information as fact should scare all of us. None of us know whether or not this is only the

beginning of Trump spreading this type of misinformation in order to make himself look better.

Regardless, the fact that many people seemingly do not fact check where they are getting their

news from means that there are a lot of people out there who do believe what Trump tweeted.

Not only does this create an ill-informed public but also increases skepticism in the integrity of

our voting system but it also establishes a precedent for Trump to say whatever he wants with

little to no consequence. This is not a precedent we can afford to establish, so it is imperative that

we call Trump, and indeed all politicians out when they share false information with us and

disguise it as fact. The future of our country depends on it.

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Works Cited

Coscarelli, Joe. "An Interview With Alex Jones, America's Leading (and Proudest) Conspiracy

Theorist." Daily Intelligencer. New York Media LLC, 17 Nov. 2013. Web. 06 Dec. 2016.

Folkenflik, David. "Radio Conspiracy Theorist Claims Ear Of Trump, Pushes 'Pizzagate'

Fictions." NPR. National Public Radio, 06 Dec. 2016. Web. 06 Dec. 2016.

McCaskill, Nolan D. "Trump Accuses Cruz's Father of Helping JFK's Assassin." POLITICO. 03

May 2016. Web. 07 Dec. 2016.

Nieva, Richard. "Does the Internet Have a Fake-news Problem?" CNET. CBS Interactive Inc, 15

Nov. 2016. Web. 06 Dec. 2016.

Revesz, Rachel. "Hillary Clinton Gets 2.7 Million Lead in the Popular Vote." The Independent.

Independent Digital News and Media, 06 Dec. 2016. Web. 07 Dec. 2016.

Schwartz, Ian. "Trump: Mexico Not Sending Us Their Best; Criminals, Drug Dealers And

Rapists Are Crossing Border." RealClearPolitics. RealClear Media Group, 16 June 2015.

Web. 6 Dec. 2016.

Smith, Allan. "Shocking Audio Emerges of Lewd Comments Trump Made about Women in

2005." Business Insider. 7 Oct. 2016. Web. 6 Dec. 2016.

Stracqualursi, Veronica. "Donald Trump's Favorability Rating at 50 Percent, New Poll

Shows." ABC News. ABC News Network, 07 Dec. 2016. Web. 07 Dec. 2016.

Trump, Donald (realDonaldTrump). In addition to winning the Electoral College in a landslide,

I won the popular vote if you deduct the millions of people who voted illegally. 27 Nov.

2016, 12:30 PM. Tweet.

Watson, Paul Joseph. "Report: Three Million Votes in Presidential Election Cast by Illegal

Aliens." Infowars. 14 Nov. 2016. Web. 06 Dec. 2016.