President Donald Trump is being criticized for new unfounded accusations against his 2020 presidential opponent, former Vice President Joe Biden.
Trump spoke with Laura Ingraham in a Fox News interview claiming, without evidence, that Biden is being controlled by “people that are in dark shadows" and who are “controlling the streets."
In a time of high tension and low trust, wild claims and conspiracy theories are increasing as the 2020 election draws closer.
The POTUS' claims were later debunked by CNN fact-checker Daniel Dale on Tuesday, but not until after he opined that the President's claims were “almost too stupid to fact check."
Watch Dale's response here:
During the interview Trump also stated that an unidentified person boarded a plane from an unidentified city and saw the dark shadow thugs donning dark uniforms to in an attempt to damage the Republican National Convention, again with no evidence to back up the claims.
The Fox News veteran and loyal Trump supporter, Ingraham, told the President during the interview that these sounded like conspiracy theories.
Dale clapped back with:
"When you have Fox's Laura Ingraham telling you it sounds like a conspiracy theory, it's probably a conspiracy theory."
Dale pointed out that Biden, like any other candidate, has his campaign run by fellow party members saying:
"Joe Biden is his own man, his campaign is run by Democrats, many of them conventional Democrats for many decades, and there are no shadowy figures on the streets or in dark clothing pulling Joe Biden's strings...."
"This is another dishonest attempt by Trump to try to foment fear about a candidate who's been in the public eye for many years."
As a former reality star, Trump has a history of creative and unfounded claims to gather public attention.
Previously he supported other conspiracy theories for his benefit including the racist birtherism against President Barack Obama that was recently resurrected to target Senator Kamala Harris, fact-less voter fraud and mail-in voting claims and that the father of his former presidential opponent Senator Ted Cruz was involved with the 1963 assassination of President John F. Kennedy.
Dale ended with a summation of Trump's pattern of accusations.
"This President is a conspiracy theorist...He just does this, and he's doing it again."
While we strive to stay above unfounded conspiracy theories we hope that everyone keeps in mind the importance of fact checking as misinformation increases this election period.
Twitter users were also fed up with the President's conspiracy theories.
Some twitter users speculated that the President was projecting again, accusing others of things he has done.
Another user called for action by the press.
While unfounded conspiracy theories are being given credence, every voter should exercise due diligence and recognize the importance of fact checking as the election draws closer.
