Donald Trump enlisted the support of some notorious conspiracy theorists for his presidential debate on Tuesday night—in which he confidently presented unfounded online rumors about Haitian immigrants eating pets as a fact.
As the former president made his outlandish claims on the national stage about cats and dogs being eaten in Springfield, Ohio—which have been rebuffed by local officials—his campaign was hosting several well-known MAGA social media activists in a “war room” to respond to the debate in real time, reports say.
Among those in the room were Jack Posobiec and Chaya Raichik, according to Axios.
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Posobiec is best known as one of the most outspoken pushers of the Pizzagate conspiracy, the false theory that claimed a child sex ring with ties to Democrats was being run out of a nonexistent basement of a pizza joint in Washington, D.C. More recently, he co-authored a book denying the humanity of progressives—titled Unhumans—which was praised in a blurb written by Trump’s running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vance.
Raichik, meanwhile, is the founder of Libs of TikTok, the anti-transgender X account which has been accused of inspiring harassment campaigns and even bomb threats.
Also in the room was Rogan O’Handley, according to CNN. The conservative commentator was last year accused of exploiting football player Damar Hamlin’s mid-game cardiac arrest to boost anti-vaccine conspiracies.
Trump also traveled to the debate on his plane with Laura Loomer, the far-right MAGA activist who had been pushing the pet-eating conspiracy online before Trump took to the stage. Loomer, who also fanned baseless claims that Vice President Kamala Harris had worn headphones disguised as earrings during the debate, then accompanied Trump the day after to events commemorating the victims of the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks—despite the fact that she last year described 9/11 as an “inside job.”
She told the Associated Press she doesn’t work for the Trump campaign and was invited to the memorial ceremonies in New York and Pennsylvania “as a guest.”
Loomer has since been called out by another diehard Trump loyalist—Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene—over an “extremely racist” post she’d made over the weekend about Harris.
During the debate, Trump said: “In Springfield, they’re eating the dogs! The people that came in, they’re eating the cats!” When ABC News moderator David Muir fact-checked the Republican nominee—explaining that city officials had denied the rumors—Trump countered that he’d seen “people on television saying ‘my dog was taken and used for food.’”
“According to residents who live in town, that’s what’s happening. President Trump is highlighting their concerns,” Karoline Leavitt told Axios, pointing to police audio of a Springfield resident reporting allegations of Haitians hunting geese.
