Former President Donald Trump’s deadly lies about the federal response to Hurricane Helene — and soon, inevitably, Hurricane Milton — depend on the impermeability of the right-wing information bubble.

President Joe Biden has directed an ongoing federal and state response to the swath of death and destruction Hurricane Helene left on the southeastern United States, an effort which includes tens of thousands of personnel helping victims across several states. 

Trump’s Helene response has been characterized by conspiracy theories and grievance-mongering for political gain.

The Biden administration won plaudits from GOP elected officials across the region, but Trump falsely claimed the federal government abandoned the public. Americans affected by the storm can access a robust program of federal assistance, but he falsely claims they could only get $750 in aid. The White House stressed there’s plenty of FEMA funds to respond to both Helene and Milton — and Republicans are reportedly the ones blocking additional funding — but Trump falsely claims Vice President Kamala Harris blew “all her FEMA money” housing immigrants. 

The former president, through these deranged fabrications, is trying to win votes in the coming election. He is summoning an alternate reality in which Biden and Harris are blithely unconcerned with the fates of millions of victims because many of those victims are Republicans and they instead prioritize immigrants. And he is doing so despite his own record  as president of allegedly withholding disaster aid for political reasons.

The only reason this strategy is remotely plausible is that the right-wing media ecosystem is willing to play along with it. The news sources Republicans rely on, from MAGA influencers to Fox stars, have bolstered Trump’s lies at every turn. The result is that right-wing audiences are bombarded with falsehoods from within an echo chamber.

The MAGA media ecosystem responds in this same fashion to every news event because its function isn’t to report on what is happening. Instead, right-wing pundits offer a scapegoat — immigrants, Jews, journalists, teachers, trans people, Democrats, anti-Trump Republicans — in order to hold their audience’s attention, make money, and support the GOP’s core agenda of tax cuts for rich people and abortion bans.

This incentive structure is universally toxic. But when it collides with issues like disaster relief, the consequences can turn deadly. Before, during, and after a hurricane, people on the ground need credible information about what to do, what help is available, and how to get it. Right now, the sources many victims depend on for news are lying to them.

Hurricane misinformation is plaguing the response to Helene. Local media outlets, federal and state officials, and emergency responders all are desperately trying to swat down rumors and falsehoods — some promoted by the former president. Republican officials in affected areas are begging the people pushing “conspiracy theory junk” to stop lying and pitch in instead.

“The scale of the misinformation — and simply the number of posts and the eyeballs that each of those are being given online, particularly on [X] — that is what is different and truly scary,” a North Carolina state official told Politico. “This has felt like you're in the Thunderdome, and people are just piping this noise in. They create this great confusion. It creates chaos and a crisis moment where you need people to be able to work together and come together.”

The calamity hearkens back to the early weeks of the COVID-19 pandemic, when Trump and his media allies first downplayed the potential impact of the deadly virus, then promoted unproven and ultimately ineffective medications as a “miracle cure.”

And it bodes ill for the coming election if Trump loses, when all the same figures will have the same incentives to help him deny and subvert the results.