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Starbird was dragged before congressional inquisitions led by Ohio GOP Representative Jim Jordan . Her University of Washington e-mail account was targeted by dozens of public records requests . As her and other universities were sued , she and her peers spent more time with lawyers than students . In some cases , the intimidation worked , as some colleagues adopted a “ strategy of silence ,” Starbird recounted in a keynote address at the Stanford Internet Observatory ’ s 2023 Trust and Safety Research Conference in September . That response , while understandable , was not the best way to counter propagandists , she said , nor inform the public about their work ’ s core insights — which is how mistaken or false beliefs take shape online , and why they are so hard to shake .
“ Some colleagues decided not to aggressively go after the false claims that we received about ourselves ,” Starbird said — such as accusations that alleged they had colluded with the government to censor right-wing speech . “ I don ’ t think that they should have gone directly at the people saying them . But we needed to get the truth out to the public … Online misinformation , disinformation , manipulation ; they remain a critical concern for society .”
Barely a week after November 2023 ’ s voting ended , the narratives dominating the news underscored her point . The reproductive rights victories and embrace of Democrats , led by growing numbers of anti-MAGA voters , had barely been parsed by the public before Trump grabbed the headlines by transgressing American political norms .
In a Veterans Day speech , of all settings , Trump , who is the leading 2024 Republican presidential candidate , attacked his domestic opponents with rhetoric that mimicked European fascist dictators that Americans had defeated in World War II . Trump called his domestic critics “ vermin ,” and pledged that , if reelected , he would use the Justice Department to “ crush ” them . Even the New York Times noted the similarity between Trump ’ s words to Adolph Hitler and Benito Mussolini .
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