Populists on the internet

“They are masters of a new kind of propaganda”

On social media, no one sounds louder than political populists.

(Bild: stock.adobe.com, krone.at-Grafik)

Ahead of the European elections in June, the right-wing populist parties are far ahead of their traditional rivals in online networks. But not only do they have more followers, they also deliberately post false reports. "Disinformation is at the heart of their communication strategies," says Johannes Hillje, who advises parties and politicians in Berlin and Brussels. "Populist parties are masters of a new kind of propaganda."

The populists are clearly ahead in terms of views and likes. According to research by Politico magazine in March, the far-right Identity and Democracy (ID) group in the European Parliament, which also includes the FPÖ and the AfD, has 1.3 million followers on TikTok. The conservative European People's Party (EPP), the largest and oldest parliamentary grouping, is followed by just 167,000 people.

The right-wing populists spread fear and anger with fake news on platforms such as Facebook, X and Instagram. Fact-checkers from the AFP news agency were able to prove that the parties on the far right were making numerous false or misleading claims on controversial topics such as migration, the war against Ukraine and climate protection.

Immigrants as scapegoats
One of the most important areas for disinformation is immigration. "Opportunistic politicians make immigrants the scapegoat for society's ills," says Natalia Banulescu-Bogdan from the Migration Policy Institute think tank in Washington. "Misinformation about migrants and migration has long been used to stoke fear and mobilize voters in Europe." Populists turn immigration into an existential issue in order to achieve electoral success.

Opportunistic politicians make immigrants the scapegoat for society's ills.

Natalia Banulescu-Bogdan, Migration Policy Institute

In March, for example, the leading candidate of the right-wing populist French party Rassemblement National, Jordan Bardella, spread the false claim on X that immigration costs France 40 billion euros a year. Authors of the study, which Bardella cited as a source, told AFP that the politician was spreading a "misleading interpretation" of their data.

Greens as the enemy
Another battleground for the right is the EU's Green Deal measures to curb climate change. In April, several AfD politicians claimed on social media that France had banned the construction and operation of wind turbines - which is not true. In fact, a court had only ruled on the permissible noise level of wind turbines.

Online networks are "handy for right-wing populist parties to push their lies and conspiracy theories", says Ayhan Kaya, Professor of European Politics at Bilgi University in Istanbul. Many election issues are complicated and therefore susceptible to disinformation. People want simple answers "to the complexity of today's globalized world", analyzes Kaya.

"TikTok stars" with connections to Moscow and Beijing
Far-right politicians such as AfD top candidate Maximilian Krah have become real TikTok stars, with their videos receiving millions of likes. The public prosecutor's office is now investigating Krah for suspicious links to Russia and China.

Every AfD TikTok video was viewed an average of 435,394 times in 2022 and 2023, says political consultant Hillje. Clips from the CDU and CSU, on the other hand, were only viewed 90,583 times on average. The gap is also considerable on YouTube.

Back in October, the EU Agency for Cybersecurity called for vigilance ahead of the European Parliament elections from 6 to 9 June, calling "campaigns to manipulate information a major threat to the electoral process".

Fake news in Hungary mostly "from the government itself"
According to the organization EU DisinfoLab, "one of the main sources of disinformation in Hungary is the government itself". Brussels reprimanded the right-wing nationalist Prime Minister Viktor Orban last year for several misleading claims on Facebook - for example, that the EU wanted to build ghettos for migrants in Hungary.

Right-wing populists "benefit from the many crises by exploiting people's fear," says political consultant Hillje. "The main problem is that disinformation spreads faster and further than information."