Commentary: Brace for tide of conspiracies with each vote
By Margaret Sullivan / The Washington Post
Nature abhors a vacuum. And so does Twitter.
As it became obvious late Monday night that a technical glitch would dramatically hold up the results of the long-anticipated Iowa caucuses, social media exploded with dark ideas about what had happened.
The hashtag MayorCheat was trending, a nasty shot at Democratic candidate Pete Buttigieg promoted by Mike Cernovich, the rabble-rousing pro-Trump media personality, who tweeted out his conspiracy theory in the early hours Tuesday about connections between the former South Bend, Indiana, mayor and the technology company behind the app at the center of the electoral screwup.
If that was too subtle, he followed up with a tweet that simply repeated RIGGED! 35 times.
President Trump wasnt far behind. Though he didnt immediately suggest malfeasance, he claimed it as a personal victory: The Democrat Caucus is an unmitigated disaster. Nothing works. His 2020 campaign manager Brad Parscale used the episode to sow doubt: Democrats are stewing in a caucus mess of their own creation with the sloppiest train wreck in history. It would be natural for people to doubt the fairness of the process, he told The Washington Posts Anne Rumsey Gearan.
Meanwhile, memes featuring Hillary Clinton hunched over a keyboard circulated with the hashtag #iowacaucusdisaster.
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