Using his social media megaphone, President Trump has pushed once-fringe beliefs into the consciousness of everyday Americans.
The big picture: The coronavirus "infodemic" that has flooded the internet with misinformation and conspiracy theories has worn down people's already faltering trust in institutions, making it easier for fringe ideas spread by the president to go viral ahead of the election.
Several fringe ideas and conspiracy theories have been pushed further mainstream by the president, often via tweets to his 85 million followers.
- Unproven cures for the coronavirus have grown in popularity after the president has promoted them. Many Trump supporters remain convinced hydroxychloroquine is a miracle COVID-19 cure but that there's a conspiracy to obscure its efficacy in fighting the disease.
- Birtherism has mutated from false claims that President Obama wasn't born in the U.S., an idea Trump built his political career on, to casting doubt on the eligibility of Democratic vice presidential candidate Kamala Harris, who was born to immigrant parents in California. The idea, which Trump promoted earlier this month before easing off of it, "isn't necessarily supposed to be believed by everybody" but still "muddies the waters and clouds clear facts about why she would be eligible," says Bryce Webster-Jacobsen of cyber intelligence firm GroupSense.