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Judd Legum Profile picture
@JuddLegum
Feb 24, 2022 • 13 tweets • 7 min read • Read on X
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1. A far-right website that LAUNCHED 36 DAYS AGO is already more popular on Facebook than the Washington Post

The DC Enquirer has executed an audacious scheme to manipulate Facebook's algorithm and ad platform

And @Meta is letting them get away with it

popular.info/p/a-far-right-…
@Meta 2. The DC Enquirer controls a network of large Facebook pages that purport to be independent

They have names like Keep Texas Red ("We are an independent group of concerned Texans who want to help keep Texas from flipping blue") and Conservative Americans

popular.info/p/a-far-right-…
@Meta 3. Each time DC Enquirer publishes an article, all of these "independent" Facebook pages post the link in unison

Here is what happened when DC Enquirer published "Freedom Convoy on the Verge of Victory as Multiple Canadian Provinces Announce an End to Restrictions" on February 9 Image
@Meta 4. How do we know these posts are coordinated? The Facebook Pages in the DC Enquirer network publish these articles within seconds of each other with identical messages

popular.info/p/a-far-right-… Image
5. Some of the pages in the DC Enquirer network are very large. "Red Wave," for example, has 650K+ followers. Many of the other pages have 100K+ followers.

How did a new website gain control of such large pages?

By manipulating the Facebook ad platform

popular.info/p/a-far-right-…
6. Let's take the Facebook page of DC Enquirer's founder, Brandon Gill.

Gill is not a particularly famous person.

He has a Twitter account with 55 followers.

He started his Facebook page on 11/6/21 and already has over 1,000,000 followers!

popular.info/p/a-far-right-… ImageImage
7. Gill has done this by spending heavily on manipulative Facebook ads that trick users into believing they are participating in a poll or petition about removing Biden (or other Dems) from office but are actually just collecting followers for his page

popular.info/p/a-far-right-… Image
8. According to the Facebook ad library, Facebook pages in the DC Enquirer network have spent between $243,000 and $298,000 on manipulative Facebook ads like these since November.

They appear to violate Facebook's spam policy but it's not being enforced

popular.info/p/a-far-right-… Image
9. These ads are manipulative but highly effective. They've allowed the DC Enquirer to build "Red Wave" from zero to 652,000 followers in 54 days.

They've had similar success with a bunch of other pages, including those just a few days old

popular.info/p/a-far-right-… Image
10. According to CrowdTangle, an analytics service owned by Facebook, links to the DC Enquirer had 2.19 million engagements over the last 10 days

The Washington Post, which employs 1000+ journalists, had 1.49 million engagements in the same 10 days

popular.info/p/a-far-right-…
11. Facebook was presented with all this information and declined to comment.

It's a $550B company, but it is unable or unwilling to enforce its own rules.

For updates and more accountability journalism, sign up for the newsletter

popular.info/subscribe
12. Facebook has also declined to comment on a similar scheme I exposed yesterday that is run by the Conservative Brief, another far-right website.

Conservative Brief has more engagement on Facebook than the New York Times

Details:

13. The two schemes are also connected. Brandon Gill, founder and editor of DC Enquirer, "provides strategic marketing direction for Conservative Brief."

Some of the Facebook pages are involved in both schemes.

popular.info/p/a-far-right-…

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More from @JuddLegum

Judd Legum Profile picture
Jan 28
1. Many large media outlets are reporting that Trump "pivoted" his strategy in Minnesota and has "changed course."

This is what the White House WANTS YOU TO BELIEVE

The only problem is it is not true
2. Is Trump ending his immigration crackdown in Minneapolis? No

Is anyone responsible for the operation being held accountable. No

Has Trump acknowledged that these killings were unjustified? Also no

popular.info/p/how-legacy-m…
3. The only thing that is changed is that Trump has replaced Greg Bovino, the Border Patrol commander overseeing the Minneapolis operation, with Tom Homan, his border czar.

The idea that Homan is a force for moderation is a joke.
Read 5 tweets
Judd Legum Profile picture
Jan 26
1. The Trump administration is not conducting its deadly immigration crackdown in Minneapolis alone

Major corporations, including @amazon, @CitizensBank, and @ATT, are enabling — and profiting from — the operation.
@amazon @CitizensBank @ATT 2. @Amazon powers much of the technological infrastructure that the Trump administration uses to target immigrants.

Amazon hosts the ICM database used by ICE which "integrates a vast ecosystem of public and private data to track down immigrants"

popular.info/p/the-corporat…
3. Hours after Alex Pretti was fatally shot at point-blank ranger, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy attended a screening of "Melania," a documentary about the First Lady, at the White House.

Amazon is paid Melania $40 million for rights to the vanity project and is spending another $35 million to promote itImage
Read 8 tweets
Judd Legum Profile picture
Jan 22
1. After months of denials, the Trump administration has admitted that DOGE staff misused Social Security data.

A DOGE staffer signed a deal to share the data with a “political advocacy group” seeking to “overturn election results"

The identity of the staffer is not disclosed but there are clues
2. Antonio Gracias, a DOGE staffer who was embedded at the SSA, publicly spoke about using Social Security data to “expose” voter fraud. During a March 30 rally alongside Elon Musk, Gracias — a fellow billionaire — made a variety of false and misleading claims.

popular.info/p/doge-staffer…
3. Gracias said that he had compared SSA data with voting records and found that non-citizens were registered to vote and did vote. He claimed he referred these people for prosecution. (There are no known charges or convictions resulting from those alleged referrals.)
Read 8 tweets
Judd Legum Profile picture
Jan 21
1. In 2025, 32 people died in ICE custody.

That figure was the largest in more than two decades and tied for the highest number of deaths among ICE’s detainee population ever.

2026 is only three weeks old, and it’s already shaping up to be much worse.
2. In just 21 days, at least six people have died in ICE custody.

Last year, ICE did not have six in-custody deaths until April 25. The early trends put ICE on pace for 120 in-custody deaths in 2026.

popular.info/p/in-2026-ice-…
3. Several of the deaths, according to advocates, are related to substandard medical care. Popular Information reported on Monday that ICE stopped paying for third-party medical treatment for detainees on October 3, 2025.

popular.info/p/ice-has-stop…
Read 4 tweets
Judd Legum Profile picture
Jan 20
1. ICE has STOPPED PAYING for medical treatment for its 73,000 detainees

ICE has not paid its bills to 3rd party providers since OCTOBER and the situation will likely persist for MONTHS, a Popular Information investigation reveals

Meanwhile, critically ill ICE detainees are not receiving care

🧵
2. ICE has not paid any third-party providers for medical care for detainees since October 3, 2025. Last week, ICE posted a notice on an obscure government website announcing it will not begin processing such claims until at least April 30, 2026.

popular.info/p/ice-has-stop…
3. ICE’s failure to pay its bills for months has caused some medical providers to deny services to ICE detainees, an administration source told Popular Information. In other cases, detainees have allegedly been denied essential medical care by ICE.
Read 10 tweets
Judd Legum Profile picture
Jan 13
1. In an interview with the New York Times, Trump claimed that, as a result of the civil rights movement, white men have been "very badly treated" and subjected to "reverse discrimination."

Trump says that white men have been excluded from colleges and jobs.

Here is the TRUTH.
2. In 2024, the data shows, white people represented 40.7% of the applicants but 53% of the enrolled students.

In contrast, Black applicants accounted for 8.7% of the applicant pool but just 5.8% of enrolled students.

popular.info/p/the-truth-ab…
3. Most college applicants are female, so many institutions admit a higher percentage of men to ensure their student population is more evenly divided by gender.

For example, in 2023, Brown University’s acceptance rate was 6.9% for male applicants and 4.2% for female applicants.
Read 8 tweets

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