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Federal inquiry traces payments from Gaetz to women; a new Florida-Puerto Rico partnership poised to transform higher-ed landscape; MT joins Tribes to target Canadian mining pollution; Heart health plummets in rural SD and nationwide; CO working families would pay more under Trump tax proposals.

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Transgender rights in Congress, a historic win for Utah's youngest elected official, scrutiny of Democratic Party leadership, and the economic impact of Trump's tax proposals highlight America's shifting political and social landscape.

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The CDC has a new plan to improve the health of rural Americans, updated data could better prepare folks for flash floods like those that devastated Appalachia, and Native American Tribes could play a key role in the nation's energy future.

UW researchers watching as election rumors ramp up

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Monday, November 4, 2024   

Researchers at the University of Washington are watching closely as rumors and false claims swirl ahead of Election Day.

The University of Washington's Center for an Informed Public has been following and analyzing misleading rumors popping up online.

Many false claims about election interference have focused on Pennsylvania, the largest swing state in the 2024 presidential race.

Kate Starbird - professor of Human Centered Design and Engineering, who co-founded the Center - said many rumors start with a kernel of truth, such as an isolated case where a voting machine didn't record a vote correctly.

"When people are saying machines aren't working, this is true," said Starbird. "It starts as a rumor but eventually becomes just fact. But it gets twisted into the this narrative that it's an intentional effort to disenfranchise certain voters, and that's false. So we can see that sort of intentionality is one place it gets twisted."

Starbird said when incidents become misleading rumors, they can obscure the remedies.

She also noted that isolated events are sometimes extrapolated to make it seem as if they're widespread when that's not the case.

She said the twisting of evidence is part of an attempt to undermine the results of the election.

Last week, fires were set at ballot drop boxes in Vancouver and Portland.

Stephen Prochaska, a graduate research assistant at the Center for an Informed Public, said people on the right and left already had a frame in place for interpreting events like these that involve blaming the other side.

"Oftentimes, they're improvising based off of these events that no one really knows to predict," said Prochaska. "Like, we don't know that that's going to happen. But they have these frames set and are able to cue audiences on how to interpret that. And this is bipartisan."

Starbird said a diverse group of actors, including influencers on social media, content creators and organizations, are loosely collaborating to define what the narrative of the 2024 election will be.

"We don't know what it is," said Starbird. "We'll have to wait for the election results, but the improvisation has been going on all along and they're certainly very active right now and they've got a very participatory audience."

Support for this reporting was provided by the Carnegie Corporation of New York.




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