Heavy snow and difficult travel expected again, heaviest snow in southern Minnesota

MPR News helps you turn down the noise and build shared understanding. Turn up your support for this public resource and keep trusted journalism accessible to all. 

Turn Up Your Support

President Trump has made criticism of Minnesota U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar a prominent part of his rallies. He's also targeted her on Twitter, prompting others to do the same. But a 

 out this week details how a small group of bad actors started that tweet storm long before Omar was on the president's radar. 

 last week. They say this unpaid messaging actually may be more damaging.

“To give you some idea of the influence of some of these accounts, one would expect that if we're looking at Ilhan Omar's Twitter network, Minnesota Public Radio would be a very influential voice. In fact, you're not.” said Lawrence Pintak, a professor at the Edward R. Murrow College of Communication at Washington State University and lead researcher on the study. 

Omar reports more death threats against her since Trump tweet

Trump-Omar feud intensifies over racism, patriotism

Trump tweets video edited to suggest Omar dismissive of 9/11

In fact, there are these other obscure accounts that are tweeting out vastly more content about Omar than your news organization,” Pintak said.

He found in the two months leading up to the 2018 election 90,000 tweets mentioned Omar, and half contained Islamophobic language. Pintak also found that a majority of those tweets originated from fewer than a dozen accounts, but were retweeted to prominence by bots.

“This isn't a grassroots movement against her. It's a manufactured outrage that is created by a handful of people and then sent out through automated means,” he said. 

They can then drown out factual information tweeted by journalism outlets, Pintak warned.

Hear a full interview with Pintak by clicking play on the audio player above.

Politics and Government News

Shows

All Things Considered

NewsPartners

Can You Believe It?

Tom Crann

Host

Megan Burks

Author

A study out this week details how a small group of bad actors started a tweet storm against Minnesota U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar long before her politics and identity became fodder for the president.  

A study out this week details how a small group of bad actors started a tweet storm against Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar long before her politics and identity became fodder for the president.  

Study: Twitter attacks on Rep. Ilhan Omar are 'manufactured outrage' of a few

Go Deeper.

Like this?