Topline
President Donald Trump on Sunday posted a fictitious headline claiming former President Barack Obama was previously collecting “royalties linked to Obamacare”—a claim that originated from a February post on a satirical news site called the “Dunning-Kruger Times.”
The claim originated on a satirical news site called the “Dunning-Kruger Times.”
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Key Facts
The Truth Social post erroneously claims the former president has collected $40 million in taxpayer-funded “royalties” since 2010, when the Affordable Care Act was signed into law.
The post does not link to an article, but the claim originated on a website for a publication called the “Dunning-Kruger Times,” a subsidiary of the America’s Last Line of Defense network, which describes itself as a “network of parody, satire, and tomfoolery.”
“Everything on this website is fiction,” the website notes in its “About Us” section, later mocking readers, “if you believe that it is real, you should have your head examined.”
It is unclear why the president shared the post, which originated much earlier this year, and captioned it simply with “WOW!”
The White House did not immediately return a request for comment from Forbes.
Key Background
The “Obamacare royalties” claim circulated earlier this year, as Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency dominated headlines while trying to enact cost-cutting measures across the federal government. The claim was quickly debunked by fact-checkers, but still was still spread widely over social media. “The ‘Obamacare Royalties’ storyline is one ALLOD has used successfully for years,” the site’s owner, Christopher Blair, told Reuters in March. “The operation thrives on confirmation bias.”
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