In the aftermath of the 2020 election, many popular political podcasters used their platforms to spread the idea that President Joe Biden’s victory was illegitimate and that he had won due to widespread voter fraud. Collectively known as the “Big Lie,” these narratives around the election played a key role in fomenting the Jan. 6 assault on the U.S. Capitol, yet the role of podcasts in spreading this conspiracy theory has been relatively unexamined. In this week’s episode of Lawfare‘s Arbiters of Truth, Valerie Wirtschafter, a senior data analyst at the Brookings Institution, and Chris Meserole, a fellow at Brookings and the director of research for the Artificial Intelligence and Emerging Technology Initiative, discuss their recent study of the role played by podcasts in spreading election fraud narratives and the challenge of content moderation in podcasts.
Commentary
Podcast: The role of podcasters in spreading the ‘Big Lie’
January 13, 2022