LOL: On Twitter, thousands of gullible Republicans think that @realdonaldtrump is ACTUALLY president! #hillarybeattrump #fakenews
WASHINGTON, D.C. -– In another worrying sign of fake news' potency, the Washington Post is reporting that millions of gullible Twitter users are following @RealDonaldTrump under the delusive belief that the failed GOP presidential candidate Donald J. Trump is actually America's president.
"I've never seen anything like it," said Yale Professor David Blight, whose work focuses on the fallibility and wilfulness of American memory. "Millions of people misremember who won the election!"
Social media experts say this disturbing parallel universe of alternate facts began the night of the 2016 election, when Trump lost the election to President Hillary Rodham Clinton in a 3 million vote landslide, but the @realdonaldtrump Tweeted, “I am the real Donald Trump, and I am now the real President of the United States – won in a landslide!”
"I thought it was Trump having a psychotic break," said New York's Frank Rich. "Actually, it was a sophisticated propaganda tactic: In a single stroke, Trump basically invented the biggest conspiracy theory this country has every seen, and told every Republican who couldn't accept the results of the election they could live in this universe of alternate facts."
Since then, @RealDonaldTrump has amassed millions of followers who operate under the mistaken belief that Trump is actually America's president, including @realjameswoods, @djaznh, @prisonplanet, @pezric, and @FOXNEWS.
Clinton's White House Press Secretary Leslie Jones refused to comment on @realdonaldtrump but warned Americans "to exercize judgement when consuming social media: There's a lot of fake news out there."
It's unclear whether @realdonaldtrump violates Twitter's terms of agreement.
A CNN focus group about @realdonaldtrump suggests many Americans don't know what to think of the Twitter handle. Is it fake news, satire, misinformation, or abstract art?
"Look, I know Hillary Clinton is president," said Tom Potter. "That's a fact. America is a democracy. That's a fact. I'm not dumb: but I don't know if this Twitter handle is really the biggest example of fake news in modern history, or just seven year-old jokester still learning to read and write," he said.
Meanwhile, @realremyma Tweeted that she's a skeptic of the handle, pointing out “whenever a handle begins with the word ‘Real,’ you can be pretty sure it’s a fake account.”
