“I think Pizzagate was really effective when people, you know, when these ads against me, these really terrible, horrible, false claims about me were running all over the internet, some with Russian money for heaven’s sakes. The people who were campaigning for me, they were on the phones, they were knocking on doors, they would have voters say, You know what? I can’t vote for her because she kills people or she trafficks children or whatever they were told and that they believed.”

— Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, quoted by Mediaite, on attacks during the 2016 presidential campaign that she ran a pedophile ring out of the basement of a pizza shop.

“Elon Musk elevated a false conspiracy theory about Democratic Senate nominee James Talarico over the weekend, lifting a fringe claim concerning the Texan’s mental health to the forefront of users’ X feeds, where it garnered hundreds of thousands of impressions,” the Washington Post reports.

Wrote Musk: “The Talarico campaign is hiding something big that voters ought to know about.”

“Musk’s reply amassed over 870,000 views, more than double the impression count of the post to which he was responding.”

Mother Jones: Elon Musk is the midterms’ biggest disinformation risk.

Aaron Blake: “Two weeks ago, GOP Sen. Eric Schmitt of Missouri saw his conspiracy theory about former special counsel Jack Smith implode spectacularly at a congressional hearing for all to see.”

“Rather than seemingly learning a lesson from that episode, the MAGA movement in recent days embraced another sketchy theory that quickly fell apart — that Texas Democratic Senate candidate James Talarico was missing from the campaign trail because of a mental health episode.”

Rolling Stone: The right’s desperate conspiracy theory about James Talarico goes up in flames.

“Imaginations run wild at what President Donald Trump and his allies might yet do to interfere in the coming midterm election. He’s already done quite a bit,” CNN reports.

“This is the man who alleged widespread voter fraud even in the two elections he won and who tried to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election he still won’t admit he lost. There’s no evidence of any such fraud.”

“Asked in recent months about some more extreme possible actions he could take in November or after, Trump has stayed coy while leaving ample room to stoke conspiracy theories, even as his top aides have continued to raise unsubstantiated concerns about voting machines and noncitizens voting.”

“Election deniers are back on the ballot,” The Guardian reports.

“In most swing states, at least one major Republican candidate has questioned or outright denied the results of the 2020 U.S. presidential election, which Donald Trump lost to Joe Biden.”