At the end of a debate performance that was widely considered disastrous, former president Donald Trump and his supporters tried to explain away the night by posting conspiracies about a “nigged” event, deeply misogynistic that attack on vice president Kamala Harris, and wild claims about the vice president’s earrings.
Within minutes of the debate, a new X conspiracy emerged, focusing not on the content of what was said but on the earrings Harris was wearing.
“Kamala Harris appeared to be lectured by using earphones embedded in her earrings during the ABC presidential debate against President Trump,” a pro-Trump disinformation account with more than half a million followers posted on X .Another major pro-Trump account also shared the conspiracy as the debate continued, and that post has been viewed more than 5 million times.
The claim is based on the fact that the earrings Harris is wearing bear a passing resemblance to a pair of so-called “audio earrings” sold on Kickstarter last year. “NOVA H1 Audio Earrings—the first and only wireless earphones embedded in a pair of pearl earrings,” reads the product description.
This conspiracy quickly gained traction among Trump supporters Tuesday night as they sought to excuse his poor performance. Several pro-Trump clickbait accounts on X and other supporters shared the conspiracy again, including Laura Loomer, a failed Florida congressional candidate and Trump acolyte who traveled with the former president to the debate.
Throughout the debate, Harris was quick to attack Trump’s weak spots—the size of the crowds at his rallies, his inherited wealth—and the former president fired back furiously, firing off nonsensical answers and outright lies. .
Trump’s answers have been full of disinformation, including lies about abortion, the election and riots in the Capitol. He even pushed the false conspiracy about illegal Haitian immigrants eating people’s pets in Springfield, Ohio.
“They eat the dogs. They eat the cats. They eat the livestock of the people who live there,” Trump claimed, repeating the baseless conspiracy trending on social media platforms like X in recent days and promoted by vice presidential candidate and Senator JD Vance of Ohio.
This claim and many others were quickly analyzed and refuted by ABC News hosts and debate moderators David Muir and Linsey Davis, a fact that clearly angered Trump even more.
Almost immediately after the debate, Trump repeated the conspiracy about a “nigged” debate from ABC News that he had been promoting for the past week.
“I thought that was my best Debate, EVER, especially since it was THREE ON ONE,” Trump wrote on Truth Social, where he tried to defend his claim about migrants eating pets by sharing links to unsubstantiated rumours.
This line of attack was echoed by Trump’s biggest supporters. “Strange how the hack moderators at (ABC News) are only ‘Fact checking’ Trump and allow Kamala to lie nonstop,” Donald Trump Jr. wrote. in X. “Fake News is the enemy of the people!”
