WASHINGTON: Dozens of Facebook groups bill themselves as Kamala Harris fan pages but mount racist attacks, criticize her record on immigration and promote her rival Donald Trump, in what disinformation researchers call a “bait-and-switch” tactic aimed at deceiving voters in a tight US election race.
The Washington-based American Sunlight Project analyzed over 300 groups on the Meta-owned platform that masquerade as pro-Harris pages while misleading the Democratic contender’s supporters with abusive, hateful posts or capitalize on her popularity to promote merchandise.
The proliferation of such Facebook groups, which typically bring together communities with shared interests, does not appear to be an organized effort and illustrates a sophisticated tactic to seed false election narratives in trusted online spaces.
“These are usually places where there is a high level of trust between members, making them more likely to believe what is being shared there, whether that is election disinformation, miracle cures or memes,” Nina Jankowicz, ASP’s co-founder and chief executive, told AFP.
The “bait-and-switch” tactic appears to target actors across the political spectrum, including Trump.
But Jankowicz, the former Department of Homeland Security disinformation chief, said her research outfit noticed an “explosion” of such groups focused on Harris since she entered the presidential race over the summer.
One group purports to be a space for “Kamala Harris fans,” with its “about” section hailing her as a “trailblazer, a symbol of diversity, and a champion for justice and equality.”
But inside the group, posts seek to undermine Harris, including one with a photo of a brown woman smearing her face with black paint alongside the caption: “Kamala getting ready to talk to Black people.”
The post echoed Trump’s false claim that Harris “turned Black” and that she was exploiting her race to woo African-American voters.
Harris is the first Black, South Asian and woman vice president in US history.

Promoting Trump rhetoric

Another group that calls itself “Democratic voices for President Kamala Harris 2024” posted messages in support of “Make America Great Again” — the political movement and slogan popularized by Trump.
One video posted in the group showed Charlie Kirk — a conservative influencer whose political organization is focused on getting Trump reelected — promoting the Republican’s anti-immigrant rhetoric.
A similar group savaged Harris as a “border czar” who has failed to curb undocumented migration into the United States — an attack line constantly repeated by Trump and his supporters.
One other group calling itself “Kamala Harris 2024” posted a sexist meme mocking the preference of some voters for a “female president” in the face of what it depicted as pressing issues confronting the country.
Many of the “Harris” groups analyzed by ASP were run by lone actors, including some non-US moderators in Africa or Eastern Europe.
Some groups posted about topics unrelated to the vice president, including religious cult-like content, and were hotbeds for spam and merchandise sales. Many were not started from scratch, having changed their names several times to capitalize on trending issues to gain traction, ASP said.

Violation of Meta policies
In a statement to AFP, a Meta spokesman said: “Protecting the election on our platforms is one of our top priorities, and we continue to enforce our policies when we find violating content or behavior.”
Meta has previously extolled Facebook groups in commercials for their power to bring people together.
The so-called bait-and-switch strategy appears to violate Meta’s policies regarding inauthentic behavior or “complex deception,” which among other things forbids the use of its platforms to deceive users about the purpose of content.
ASP said the groups it analyzed were a representative sample and it was unable to get a fulsome picture of the scale of the abuse after Meta in August shut down CrowdTangle — a digital tool researchers hailed as vital in monitoring falsehoods.
Meta has replaced it with a Content Library, a technology that has similar functionality but is still under development.
ASP shared samples of a handful of similar “bait-and-switch” groups dedicated to Trump.
“This phenomenon isn’t unique to Harris — groups are used and abused this way across the political spectrum and across topics,” Jankowicz said.
“As we get closer to Election Day and during what is likely to be a tumultuous transition period to follow, it’s important that people slow down and try to be more deliberate when consuming content online,” she added.
 

NEW HALFA, Sudan: Khadir Ali and his family managed to survive a harrowing paramilitary attack in war-torn Sudan. But by the time they got to safety, he realized that one person was missing.
“We escaped in total chaos — there was gunfire coming from every direction,” said the 47-year-old civil servant of the October 22 Rapid Support Forces attack on Rufaa in Al-Jazira state.
“But once we got out of the city, we noticed my nephew wasn’t with us,” he said.
Mohammed, 17, suffers from a congenital skin condition and “needs special care.”
The teenager is among scores of people reported missing as the RSF stages major attacks across eastern Al-Jazira state after a high-ranking officer from the area defected to the army.
In retaliation, the RSF has been “killing people in their homes, in markets and on the streets, and looting property including from markets and hospitals,” rights group Amnesty International said on Wednesday.
“Six days have passed, and we know nothing about him,” Ali said, speaking in New Halfa in Kassala state.
He and his family have taken refuge there after an arduous 150-kilometer (90-mile) journey.
At least 124 people have been killed and dozens wounded in the fighting in Al-Jazira state over the past 10 days, according to the United Nations.
The death toll for the whole month is at least 200.
War has raged in Sudan since April 2023 between the army under the country’s de facto ruler Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan and the RSF, led by his former deputy Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo.
The conflict has triggered one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises. More than half the population — 25 million people — face acute hunger.

So many persons missing
The UN Office for Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reports that more than 119,000 people have fled from Al-Jazira state amid the recent surge of violence.
Mohamed Al-Obaid from Al-Hajjilij village in the state told AFP his story.
“So far, we’ve counted 170 missing from our village. Entire families are unaccounted for,” he said from New Halfa, where some children arrive unaccompanied by family members.
Since February, communications networks and Internet services have been almost entirely severed in the state, making it practically impossible to check on someone’s whereabouts.
Activist Ali Bashir, who helps people get away from villages in eastern Al-Jazira, said “the communications blackouts are making the missing persons crisis even worse.”
Sudanese social media are filled with posts about missing persons, with activists sharing the pictures and names, many of them children or elderly.
Earlier this month, intense clashes between the army and the RSF spread to Al-Jazira’s Tamboul city.
Just hours after the army said it had taken control of Tamboul, witnesses reported that the paramilitaries were continuing to operate there, causing thousands of civilians to flee.
Among them was trader Osman Abdel Karim, who lost track of two of his sons during fighting on October 19.
“Two of my sons, one 15 and the other 13, were outside when the attack began that Saturday night, and we had to leave without them,” the 43-year-old said.
“Ten days have passed, and we don’t know if they’re dead or alive.”