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CNN —
In this heated political local weather, there’s a tendency to easily reject people who find themselves saying the fallacious factor and to disregard conspiracy theorists wholesale.
But because the U.S. approaches its third consecutive election through which misinformation and the combat in opposition to it are anticipated to play a job, it is vital to grasp what drives individuals to mistrust U.S. elections. .
CNN’s Donnie O’Sullivan and his group will air the hour-long documentary “Misinformation Nation: Trump Believers” on Sunday at 8pm ET on “All About Anderson Cooper.”
I spoke to O’Sullivan concerning the documentary. In it, he has frank and disarming talks with individuals about what has shaken their religion in America. However, he paints a worrying image of the rise of fringe actions within the nation.
Our dialog, which passed off over the cellphone and has been edited for size, is beneath.
The fringe contaminated the mainstream.
Wolf: What have been you making an attempt to perform with this venture?
O’Sullivan: So a lot of mainstream American politics proper now has been contaminated and influenced by what was as soon as thought of to be the true fringe – what’s occurring on fringe platforms and fringe people.
And I feel what we actually need to do with this present is clarify how these personalities could also be pushing falsehoods, however they’re not fringe. This is all occurring now. And it has a big impact on our democracy.
Wolf: Your demeanor is pleasant when interviewing people who find themselves saying the fallacious issues. It reveals my respect. While you identified the inaccuracies of what individuals mentioned throughout the interview, you ended up speaking to individuals as a substitute of in opposition to them, so I’m fantastic with that. relieved. How do you conduct these interviews?
O’Sullivan: I do not see my job as going out to vary individuals’s minds. There are many others who can do it or who may strive it. I need to hear what these individuals imagine and why they imagine it.
Obviously, once we current to an viewers, we be sure that individuals know the information. But I feel it is actually vital to grasp that we’re all human and method the interview with an open thoughts.
People in lots of international locations imagine this. Latest ballot — I take into consideration a 3rd of Americans imagine Joe Biden didn’t legitimately win the final election. I take into consideration 1 / 4 of Americans believed that January sixth was an FBI orchestration or that the FBI was concerned. That’s tens of hundreds of thousands of individuals.
Most of those persons are simply regular individuals. They have jobs, households, and involvement of their communities. But for some motive, they’re obsessive about this election-related subject, they’re obsessive about QAnon and different subjects.
So I feel it is essential to deal with everybody with respect, even when they do not essentially need to present us respect.
We confirmed a few of the interviews on the air with a few of the individuals we met alongside the way in which. Rachel Powell is presently serving a federal jail sentence for a criminal offense she dedicated on January sixth. She is her mom and in addition her grandmother. When we revealed a part of that interview, there have been a whole lot of feedback on-line saying, “Why are you humanizing this girl?” My reply to that was: “She’s human.”
05:55 – Source: CNN
O’Sullivan asks Rachel Powell, who might be in jail beginning January sixth, if Trump is accountable.take heed to her response
Wolf: It’s not your job to vary individuals’s minds, however after reporting this documentary, what do you assume you are able to do to get individuals to agree on the identical set of information?
O’Sullivan: There is not any resolution. I feel listening and speaking to individuals is a giant a part of that. We spoke to Colorado resident Joe Black.
(Note: They meet at a Donald Trump rally, O’Sullivan calls Black, and so they find yourself at Black’s home, the place they evaluate what Black sees on social media to what O’Sullivan sees. )
He did not even know CNN fact-checked Joe Biden.
(Note: CNN does so much.)
That opens individuals’s eyes somewhat bit. But I feel what’s extra vital is that you just’re prepared to have the dialog within the first place. Be prepared to really sit down and speak to individuals within the first place.
And I’m positive lots of our readers have members of the family or associates who’ve entered the world of election lies and conspiracy theories. According to the consultants I spoke to on this, empathy is a giant a part of it, whether or not it is cults or conspiracy theories. Even if you happen to begin saying, “They’re idiots,” you are not going to persuade anybody of the information.
Wolf: The general theme of the present is the Christian nationalist perception that the United States is a Christian nation, with Christianity enshrined all through the Constitution and founding paperwork. There are some attention-grabbing moments within the present the place individuals understand that the phrase “God” would not really seem within the Constitution. Did you count on that? Or is it one thing you stumbled upon?
O’Sullivan: There are so many elements which might be intertwined with what is going on on on this nation proper now, particularly in relation to belief and mistrust in democracy, and Christian nationalism is considered one of them. We wished to indicate on this documentary how these two threads are intertwined.
When it involves Christian nationalism particularly, we selected that path as a result of 1) we hear it so much at occasions like this, and a pair of) there is a rising consciousness of it.
Tim Alberta revealed an excellent e-book about it final yr.
(Note: Watch CNN’s Christiane Amanpour’s interview with Alberta.)
Most of all, it speaks to evangelicals and different Christians who’re actually apprehensive proper now about what they’re seeing, how their religion is being weaponized in ways in which assault democracy. It was from speaking to pastors.
In phrases of this sort of speedy weaponization of conservative Christianity, a whole lot of it isn’t new, however I feel there’s an urgency to it now that we have by no means seen earlier than.
Pastors have seen congregations and congregations go away as a result of their sermons weren’t political sufficient or didn’t instantly assist Trump as a candidate.
When it involves God within the Constitution, Pastor Caleb Campbell talks about sitting down with fellow evangelicals within the documentary, and he is a theological evangelical, and many individuals imagine that the Christian God is the Constitution. I imagine that it dwells in all places. That will not be the case in any respect, though the founding paperwork are usually not.
There is nothing fallacious with being a Christian. There’s nothing fallacious with being a patriot. But what actually occurs with Christian nationalism is that it promotes a really particular kind of Christianity on the expense of different individuals’s freedoms.
02:06 – Source: CNN
See what occurs when a Trump supporter talks to a CNN reporter concerning the Constitution
Wolf: You’ve lined a few of these fringe actions, and you have additionally lined some social media, however what do individuals have to know concerning the rise of those sorts of fringe social media platforms? What do you assume?Documentary — is gaining consideration.
O’Sullivan: Since January sixth, many individuals have been banned from main social media platforms. Trump was additionally expelled, however what many individuals do not understand is that lots of his supporters have been additionally expelled. Share election conspiracy theories and extra.
In the documentary, we meet a kind of individuals, Joe Black. He says he was banned from Facebook after sharing a meme about January sixth.
(Note: Ms. Black mentioned she felt remoted by not with the ability to do easy issues like buy merchandise on Facebook.)
It pushes individuals into the darkish corners of the web and might develop into extra excessive and radicalized. That’s a dilemma, is not it? Because main social media platforms like Facebook have these guidelines. But what occurs whenever you kick out a whole lot of these individuals is they generally go to extra excessive platforms.
Obviously, Twitter X has modified so much. (Note: Twitter has modified so much because it was acquired by Elon Musk and ended lots of its moderation protections.) But general, 2016 has thrown all of the guards off in relation to social media. I feel it was free. There have been Russian trolls and all that stuff.
Then, in 2020, there was a large crackdown by social media platforms that obtained an enormous backlash from conservatives. And now it seems like we’re in a totally new panorama – it has fully modified once more.
WOLF: There’s a girl you interview, Rachel Powell. The mom you speak to is on her approach to jail. Is she in jail now? Are you continue to in contact?
O’Sullivan: She’s in jail. I really obtained a letter from her this week from a jail in West Virginia. I feel she despatched her letter over a month in the past. But it wasn’t till this week that it reached me.
She is holding on to the hope that Trump might be granted a pardon if he’s re-elected. Obviously, so much is at stake on this election for her. It’s attention-grabbing as a result of clearly President Trump, particularly in current months, has actually began to shine a highlight on the individuals who have been indicted on January sixth, portray them as form of martyrs.
she is in jail. She has a cellmate. But belief in Trump and his ilk by no means appears to wane.