Molly Butler / Media Matters
If your Facebook feed was filled with stories from The Epoch Times and its affiliated pages in the aftermath of the 2020 election, overthrowing the U.S. government on January 6 might have seemed like a reasonable thing to attempt.
In the days, weeks, and months that preceded the ransacking of the Capitol by a pro-Trump mob, right-wing conspiracy theory rag The Epoch Times and its sister network New Tang Dynasty (NTD) flooded their audience with deranged conspiracy theories designed to undermine faith in the presidential election results. To that end, the network enthusiastically and credulously parroted false claims of voter fraud that emanated from the far right, including hundreds of posts about Dominion Voting Systems, an election systems company that pro-Trump media falsely accused of rigging the election for President Joe Biden as part of a global conspiracy originating from Venezuela. They also prominently featured Trump-aligned fringe personalities like attorneys Sidney Powell and Lin Wood and businessman Mike Lindell across their pages and promoted “Stop the Steal” events from organizers Ali Alexander and Alex Bruesewitz.