.WHEN DONALD TRUMP completed the word "Springfield" 33 mins into the American presidential discussion on September 10th, David Muir, the co-moderator, was prepped. Because tiny Ohio city, Mr Trump declared, illegal immigrants are "consuming the pet dogs, they are actually eating the felines, they're consuming the dogs of people that reside there". Mr Muir quickly answered that, depending on to Springfield's city manager, there were no reputable records of pet-eating. The former president's insurance claim should possess struck numerous viewers as unusual. But great deals of Mr Trump's fans were primed for it: the charge had been actually moving around in conservative circles on social media sites, increased by Elon Musk, the proprietor of X. How performed the community become at the centre of a conservative conspiracy idea?