The lie used as a political weapon is nothing new, as well as the use of press sectors to give credibility to false events or conspiracy theories. One of the most famous examples of political manipulation in history became known as the "Dreyfus Affair", in which a French captain of Jewish origin named Alfred Dreyfus was wrongfully convicted of allegedly passing on military secrets to the Germans. The debates kept France society divided from 1894 to 1906, with the more progressive sectors defending his innocence and the more conservative group insisting on Dreyfus' guilt. After being imprisoned in French Guiana and having his conviction ratified, the public opinion pressured his release that occurred in 1899. In 1906 Dreyfus was rehabilitation to the army after the truth of the facts came to light.

Other examples can be cited, including in the United States, when Senator Joseph McCarthy started a crusade against communists in the post-World War II period, when he persecuted several intellectuals and artists, among them Charles Chaplin. The latter, who then fled from the USA. More recently, a pervasive Internet conspiracy theory known as Q-Anon has mobilized broad swaths of the Republican Party, turning its believers into a considerable political force in the party.

In keeping with this belief, the Democratic Party harbors a secret cabal of Satan-worshippers, pedophiles, and cannibals that run a global child sex trafficking ring and conspire against former President Donald Trump and his supporters. The conspiracy would have been engineered based on a secret plan of the so-called "Deep State".

This conspiracy theory would have emerged in October 2017, on the Internet social media, through a post written by an anonymous who used the pseudonym "Q”. The post was largely shared and then went viral on the Internet. 

"Q" claimed to have access to classified information about opponents of the Trump administration and (falsely) accused many liberal Hollywood actors, Democratic politicians, and senior officials of being involved in an international ring of child sex trafficking.

Supporters of the Q-Anon theory gained a lot of space in the Republican party and eventually elected a bench of congresspeople whose "pop star" is Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA). 

Taylor Greene is notable for speeches based on "memes" and conspiracy theories, such as associating the Build Back Better Initiative, issued by Joe Biden, which seeks to replace fossil energies with renewable sources in the United States. The Congresswoman accused the Biden government of killing the country's independence energy. For her, it's a capitulation strategy to the Chinese government, which is interested in selling their solar or wind generation equipment.

The latest manipulation to cause controversy in American society concerns the problem of supplying baby formula. Republican Representatives Kat Cammack (FL) and Elise Stefanik (NY) created a false claim that the shortage of the product on supermarket and drugstore shelves was because the Biden Administration prioritized the children of immigrant families that are imprisoned in detention camps along the border with Mexico. Because of this, supposedly, the parents of American babies were left without a supply of baby formula. On social media, Cammack posted a collage of an alleged photograph of the stock of milk powder at Ursula's Immigrant Detention Center and another photo with an empty shelf in an American market (https://twitter.com/Kat_Cammack). See the screenshot of the post on Twitter below:

 

This conspiracy theory is mobilizing public opinion. The New York Times, The Washington Post, Floridian Press, Fox Business among many others. Even Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the House of Representatives, was urged to participate in the debate. In an interview with George Stephanopoulos, ABC network, she was confronted with the baby formula shortage and the criticism of Representative Elise Stefanik (R-NY) about the supply of baby formula to children in immigrant detention camps. According to Pelosi: As usual, her statement is totally irresponsible.  Babies are crying.  We need to get them food.  And the President has – now what we're doing this week in the Congress is, again, Bobby Scott, Chair of the Education and Labor Committee, that's the jurisdiction – that will lower some of the regulations, et cetera, so that it's easier to buy it.  Fifty percent of the — of WIC — 50 percent of the — [The Women, Infants and Children program]. And so loosening that. But in addition to that, Rosa DeLauro, who has been on this case for a while – she was the Chair of the Agriculture Subcommittee of Appropriations when she – now she's Chair of the whole Committee. But she has been working on this to have some funding so that we can immediately purchase, overseas – there are four countries, Chile, Mexico, Ireland and the Netherlands, that have supply that might be available to us.”

The baby formula issue is helping Biden's opponents attack the government on three fronts: (1) inflation, (02) immigration, and (3) shortages. Regarding the first problem, the rising prices in the country are the biggest crisis since the crisis caused by the oil shocks in the 1970s. In April 2022, the annualized inflation rate was at 8.3%. The increase in fuel and food prices strongly impacts lower-income families, a range in which minority groups such as blacks and Latinos/Hispanics are found. However, the effects are felt by all social classes, which negatively influences the approval of Joe Biden and the Democratic Party.

The issue of immigration is also very controversial. While Latino voters expect the government to move forward with easing the rules, Republicans seek to block access to a new wave of refugees from Mexico, Cuba, and the Northern Triangle of Central America. The Conservative majority on the Supreme Court is imposing consecutive defeats on the Biden administration on this issue. The Senate, where Democrats have a shaky majority, is also a source of frustration, as little progress has been made in passing legislation that could relax the rules and legalize undocumented people. Finally, the problem of shortages, such as the one that affects the supply of baby formula.

The Covid-19 pandemic disrupted several production chains, as in the case of the supply of semiconductors to different industrial areas, especially the automotive sector. In the specific case of dairy products, the great demand for baby formula at the beginning of the pandemic contributed to production distortions because at the moment, following the large stockpiling of products by families, demand fell sharply, a fact that led to the stoppage of production lines. With the end of restrictive measures in the pandemic and the resumption of birth numbers, there was demand growth, but companies have not yet managed to normalize production.

Due to the challenges faced by the US economy and the criticisms to the government for the current situation, Nancy Pelosi, on May 13, sent a press release to her colleagues in the Democratic Party, in which she addressed the issue of the lack of consumer goods.: “The baby formula emergency also serves as a critical reminder of the urgent need to invest in strengthening our supply chains.  This past week, the Congress began bipartisan and bicameral work to assemble our final America COMPETES legislation, which will deliver transformative investments to reduce disruptions and lower costs for the essential goods American families need.  For American families and the American economy, it is vital that we get this cost-cutting, supply chain package to the President’s desk.”

The episode draws attention to how a minor political event acquired significant importance in the electoral debate due to the use of half-truths or fake news to boost political candidacies precisely when the primaries of the two main parties take place. For people of average intelligence, it sounds absurd to imagine that the supply of powdered milk to a few hundred babies of immigrants imprisoned in detention camps on the border with Mexico is responsible for the lack of the product for more than 3.5 million American babies. However, this is not important for the segment that feeds on conspiracy theories, such as Q-Anon. It is not a rational or quantitative issue but an element that adds to the prejudices rooted in the population that support the Republican Party.

It is worth noting that the mainstream conservative media has also fueled the debate about fake news. In this narrative, which simultaneously accuses the Biden administration of putting Americans in "last place" (remembering that Donald Trump uses the slogan "America First") while dehumanizing immigrants, even babies, a false contradiction is created between the rights of the national baby against that of the "alien" baby. The media group News Corp, owned by tycoon Rupert Murdoch, which is at the forefront of this endeavor, deserves special mention. This multinational media group controls one of the oldest newspapers in the United States, the New York Post, and Fox Corporation, managing the Fox News television network.

For the baby formula scandal and other topics, traditional media leverage fake scandals created on social media, giving credibility to lies to a more significant portion of the population. There is a Machiavellian mechanism in this procedure. See New York Post: " Border detention center looks stocked with baby formula despite shortage" and Fox News: " GOP rep says illegal migrants sent ‘pallets’ of hard-to-find baby formula. Cammack's claim comes as American parents worry about a shortage of baby formula". 

Regarding this debate, it is worth reading the Snopes news verification site, where it analyzes and demystifies the arguments of Republicans around the controversy over powdered milk and immigration detention centers.

From the point of view of our analysis, it is important to understand the mechanism behind the creation of fake news and how a minor issue becomes a topic that mobilizes the media and social networks and forces the House's Speaker to take a stand. The tactic was highly successful for the creators of the false connection between immigration and the baby formula shortage. It put the Biden administration on the defensive in the face of a problem for which it cannot be accused of negligence. The law of the United States guarantees detainees under state custody the right to food, including babies. At the same way, inflation afflicts several countries worldwide, including the US. 

In this regard, Republican strategists scored another point against Democrats, whose prestige declined since Joe Biden took office in January 2021. Finally, it is worth mentioning that the mainstream conservative press has renounced any objective or neutral stance favoring their preferred party's conquest of political power. In this game, the immigrants' lives don't matter.

P.S. After we concluded our analysis, we faced a new movement on this crisis. According to New York Times, on May 18, Joe Biden took urgent action on Wednesday to address the nationwide baby formula shortage, invoking the Defense Production Act to increase production and creating “Operation Fly Formula” to deploy Defense Department planes and speed formula shipments into the United States from overseas. The White House announced the plan only hours before the House took action of its own, approving an emergency infusion of $28 million for the Food and Drug Administration and a bill to loosen restrictions on what kind of formula can be purchased through the federal food aid program for women and babies.