On Friday, Judge Merchan sent a letter to all parties about a social media post claiming that a juror leaked a told a cousin Trump would be convicted. More evidence has surfaced that makes the post look like a hoax.
Read: The Republican Presumptive Nominee for President is A Convicted Felon
Judge Merchan sent a letter to all parties in the case after the New York Court System Facebook page flagged a post that stated:
“My cousin is a juror and says Trump is getting convicted,” the user wrote in a week-old comment, according to the judge. “Thank you folks for all your hard work!!!!”
This post caused some uproar among the social media legal eagles, but there was a problem.
As people started digging, it became clear that the poster was an Internet troll.
MSNBC’s Katie Phang pointed out that the post was made ten days before the verdict, or nineish days before the jury ever got the case:
Assuming this is the same “Michael Anderson,” I don’t think that the post is real. It also looks like it was made on May 20th. Trump’s verdict didn’t come in until ten days later on May 30th.
Plus, the poster’s FB profile says: “a professional shit poster”. 🤷🏻♀️ pic.twitter.com/YmnVbl6omM
— Katie Phang (@KatiePhang) June 7, 2024
This nonsense will no doubt be used by Donald Trump to claim that the trial was rigged, which was probably the poster’s point.
Instead of riots in the streets or anything else that Trump has been promising, we have Internet trolls trying to discredit the trial.
It is understandable that Judge Merchan would want to be careful given the historic nature of the case and the appeals process that is certain to follow, but shouldn’t somebody have done some research and asked some questions before the judge notified all parties?
This sort of thing happens on social media every minute of every hour of every day. Giving attention to hoaxes will only cause more problems, but before Trump can even say it, it appears that the post about the juror was not real.
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Jason is the managing editor. He is also a White House Press Pool and a Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Jason has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science. His graduate work focused on public policy, with a specialization in social reform movements.
Awards and Professional Memberships
Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association
