A bizarre left-wing conspiracy theory has falsely claimed that Elon Musk’s Starlink satellites were used to ‘steal’ the US presidency for Trump.
Claims circulating on social media that 20 million votes in the election “disappeared” and that Musk’s satellites were used to disrupt vote-counting machines.
The allegations are unsubstantiated and no evidence has been presented to support the claims, as many voting machines in the US typically cannot connect to the internet to prevent election interference.
Meanwhile, allegations that millions of votes are missing are likely due to slow voting in large states like California, which – to date – had only processed about 76 percent of ballots, despite calls for Kamala Harris last week.
The Daily Telegraph This was reported by the director of the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, Jen Easterly. said there was “no evidence of any malicious activity materially impacting the security or integrity of our election infrastructure.”
Claims circulating on social media that 20 million votes in the election ‘disappeared’ and that Elon Musk’s Starlink satellites were used to disrupt vote counting machines
Trump’s victory last week, which saw him sweep the popular vote and leave Democrats facing their worst showing since 1988, has led to disgruntled left-wing voters sharing false claims online
Posts on Musk-owned X promoting conspiracy theories surrounding Starlink have received thousands of likes
Still, conspiracy theories from disgruntled left-wing voters unhappy with Tuesday’s outcome, the worst for Democrats in the presidential election since 1988, continue to spread the false claims.
The posts receive thousands of likes and millions of views. One video shared on TikTok claiming states had “used Starlink to tabulate or count ballots” had more than 100,000 likes and nearly a million views.
Other conspiracy theorists on the platform have made bizarre claims that Vice President Harris referred to Starlink during her concession speech.
During her speech, Harris quoted an old saying: “Only when it is dark enough can you see the stars.”
Many people online have latched onto a quote – which has been used in the past by prominent figures including Martin Luther King Jr. – to justify their unfounded concerns that the election was stolen.
Similarly, Musk-owned X-posts promoting the conspiracy theories surrounding Starlink have also received thousands of likes.
Despite Trump’s landslide election victory, right-wing conspiracy theorists are also perpetuating false claims that this year’s decline in turnout justifies their false concerns in 2020.
The allegations of Starlink’s involvement in the election are unsubstantiated and no evidence has been provided to support the claims, as many voting machines in the US are typically unable to connect to the Internet to prevent election interference.
Right-wing conspiracy theorists are also perpetuating the claim that last week’s outcome justifies their false concerns during the 2020 election.
Kamala Harris during her concession speech. Online conspiracy theorists have made bizarre claims that Vice President Harris referred to Starlink during her concession speech
Fact-checkers have rushed to debunk the claims.
Disinformation analysts at NewsGuard reported that in the hours after it became clear that Trump had won, “left-leaning social media users claimed that the apparent momentum behind Kamala Harris before the election made it impossible for her to lose, so the only explanation was widespread fraud.”
Meanwhile, analysts at Cyabra, an Israeli start-up that tracks disinformation campaigns, said the rise in posts was initially caused by a network of fake accounts, before real online influencers picked up the claims.
Cyabra found that 270 apparently fake X-profiles sent more than 2,100 messages, including the hashtag, which were viewed approximately 40 million times. After this, true Harris supporters began sharing the same claims.
MailOnline has approached X and TikTok for a response.