False videos, fake headlines, and inaccurate chatbot responses fueled conspiracy theories online following Charlie Kirk’s fatal shooting in Utah.
Confusion and conspiracy theories spread online after conservative activist Charlie Kirk was fatally shot during a university appearance in Orem, Utah, on Wednesday. As the manhunt continued, baseless claims emerged about the shooter’s identity and the circumstances of the attack.
Videos misidentified unrelated arrests as connected to the shooting. One clip of Provo police detaining an older man was falsely tied to the incident. Another video wrongly linked a Black man arrested in Santa Monica in June to Kirk’s death. Footage from a Reno casino shooting in July was also repurposed as “evidence.” A Washington woman’s photo circulated with claims she was the shooter, which she denied, telling Reuters she was in Seattle at the time.
Fabricated headlines fueled further speculation. A fake CNN graphic claimed Kirk once joked about being shot in Utah. A New York Times headline was shared with a misleading timestamp suggesting foreknowledge of the attack, which both the outlet and Google later debunked.
AI chatbots amplified the confusion. Perplexity’s bot initially claimed Kirk was alive and called a White House statement “fabricated.” xAI’s Grok falsely reported a suspect named Michael Mallinson was detained before retracting, and mischaracterized a Turning Point USA statement as fake.
Both AI firms acknowledged inaccuracies, with Perplexity stressing it does not claim “100% accuracy.”
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