Did ¨President Trump order drug test for all congressmen and -women so he could replace the ones that failed it with people appointed by himself? No, that's not true. The story was published by a liberal satire website that tries to educate gullible Trump supporters and Republicans about the need to actually click and read links before sharing or liking them in order to avoid being embarrassed by fans of the site later. All the events described in the article are not real.
The story originated from an article published by America's Last Line of Defense on December 29, 2018 titled "BREAKING: President Trump Orders Drug Tests for All Members of Congress" (archived here) which opened:
President Trump has issued an 11th-hour order to all incoming members of Congress to stop at an approved facility before the swearing-in ceremony this weekend for a mandatory drug test. According to federal law, the Chief Executive is in charge of employment protocols for every branch of government, meaning he has the right and the power to force mandatory drug testing.
According to White House Director of Information and Propaganda, Art Tubolls, the move isn't only legal, it's necessary:
"We have several members of Congress openly addicted to bloogies. If it spreads, we're looking at our own lawmakers working for themselves instead of the people. That's not how government works. Therefore, anyone who fails the mandatory test for opiates, cocaine, marijuana, bloogies, and quaaludes will be fired and replaced with an appointee of Trump's choosing."
Users on social media only saw this title, description and thumbnail so they wouldn't have seen the type of site it originated from:
BREAKING: President Trump Orders Drug Tests for All Members of Congress
There's a reason they want the drugs to pour in.
There are several hints the story is false. First, there is no such drug as "bloogies" and "Art Tubbols" is just an anagram for "Busta Troll", the nickname of the owner of the site. The story was also posted under the category "BREAKING SATIRE".
The site comes with a clear satire disclaimer at the bottom of each article:
sat·ire ~ˈsaˌtī(ə)r
noun
the use of humor, irony, exaggeration, OR ridicule to expose and criticize people's stupidity or vices, particularly in the context of contemporary politics and other topical issues.
If you disagree with the definition of satire or have decided it is synonymous with "comedy," you should really just move along.
The owner and main writer of the site is self-professed liberal troll Christopher Blair, a man from Maine who has made it his full time job to troll gullible conservatives and Trump supporters into liking and sharing his articles. He runs several other websites, including potatriotpost.us, dailyworldupdate.us and nofakenewsonline.us. Sometimes he is also known under his nickname "Busta Troll". A second man working on the sites is John Prager as revealed in this earlier story we wrote.
Articles from Blair's sites frequently get copied by "real" fake news sites who often omit the satire disclaimer and any other hints the stories are fake. Blair has tried to get these sites shut down in the past but new ones keep cropping up and he keeps knocking them down.
Blair and his operation were profiled by the Washington Post on November 17, 2018 by Eli Saslow:
'Nothing on this page is real': How lies become truth in online America
November 17 The only light in the house came from the glow of three computer monitors, and Christopher Blair, 46, sat down at a keyboard and started to type. His wife had left for work and his children were on their way to school, but waiting online was his other community, an unreality where nothing was exactly as it seemed.
If you are interested in learning more about Blair and the history of his sites, here is something to get you started:
The Ultimate Christopher Blair and America's Last Line of Defense Reading List | Lead Stories
STORY UPDATED: check for updates below. Yesterday Eli Saslow at the Washington Post wrote a fantastic article about Christopher Blair, a man from Maine who has been trolling conservatives and Trump supporters online for years and occasionally even made a living out of it.
If you see one of his stories on a site that does not contain a satire disclaimer, assume it is fake news. If you do see the satire disclaimer it is of course also fake news.
NewsGuard, a company that uses trained journalist to rank the reliability of websites, describes wearethellod.com as:
A site that publishes false stories and hoaxes that are often mistaken for real news, part of a network named America's Last Line of Defense run by hoax perpetrator Christopher Blair.
According to NewsGuard the site does not maintain basic standards of accuracy and accountability. Read their full assessment here.
We wrote about wearethellod.com before, here are our most recent articles that mention the site:
- Fake News: President Trump Did NOT Order DOJ To Stop Using Arabic Numerals
- Fake News: Mike Pence NOT To Resign 'At The Request of the President'
- Fake News: Democrats Did NOT Cave, Did NOT Authorize Full Funding Of Wall To Avoid Shutdown
- Fake News: Penny Marshall Did NOT Donate Estate to Trump 2020
- Fake News: Colin Kaepernick NOT Arrested In Massive $200k Drug Bust
