President Joe Biden’s decision to bow out of the 2024 election followed weeks of pressure from Democrats concerned about his age and ability to win and serve another four years. But conspiracy theorists, right-wing influencers and even some Republican politicians immediately cast Biden’s resignation from the campaign as evidence of something more sinister.

The flurry of unverified rumors, speculation, and conspiracy theories comes as people are reeling from an onslaught of high-stakes political upheaval, from the assassination attempt against former President Donald Trump on July 13 to Biden’s withdrawal from the race eight days later.

On the most extreme end, Charlie Kirk of the conservative youth organization Turning Point USA and far-right activist Laura Loomer suggested, without evidence, that Biden may be dying or already dead.

Others, including billionaire hedge fund boss Bill Ackman, raised doubts over the president’s letter announcing his decision, baselessly suggesting his signature wasn’t really his.

Republican politicians including U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert of Colorado speculated about why Biden had not been seen in public since the announcement. On Tuesday, the president emerged from his beach house in Delaware where he had been isolating while recovering from Covid. He plans to address the nation on Wednesday.

“If this were a hostage situation, that letter would not qualify as proof of life,” Ackman posted on X on Sunday. (On Tuesday, Ackman shared a post with a video of Biden boarding Air Force One that read in part, “President Joe Biden seen in public for the first time in nearly a week, debunking conspiracy theories online.”)

Still others on the right framed Biden’s move as not his at all, but an anti-democratic coup orchestrated by shadowy forces including George Soros, a frequent target of conspiracy theories. In doing so, they cast doubt on the legitimacy of Vice President Kamala Harris’s candidacy — and, ultimately, on the election as a whole.

“The idea of selecting the Democrat[ic] Party’s nominee because George Soros and Barack Obama and a couple of elite Democrats got in a smoke-filled room and decided to throw Joe Biden overboard, that is not how it works,” Republican vice presidential nominee JD Vance told the crowd at a rally in Ohio on Monday.

Harris is also being targeted with baseless claims and conspiracy theories, including the long-running falsehood that she’s not really an American citizen, despite the fact she was born in Oakland, Calif. These “birther” smears came up when she ran for president in 2020 and were amplified by Trump, who previously promoted similar false claims about former president Barack Obama.

After any breaking news event, people search for answers that may not be available right away. That information void is a ripe environment for the spread of incorrect and incomplete information, as well as for exploitation by those seeking to gain clout or financial reward by amplifying the wildest theories, said Melissa Ryan, CEO of consulting firm CARD Strategies, which tracks disinformation and extremism.

“The thing to understand is for folks who live in this cinematic universe, things are never what they seem. It’s always a false flag,” said Ryan.

When Biden called in to an event with Harris and campaign staff on Monday, some online commentators immediately began to speculate that it was not in fact Biden’s voice, but a deepfake created with artificial intelligence.

Some figures on the right had been pressing the narrative, without evidence, that Biden would be replaced on the Democratic ticket at the last minute since at least last fall. Much of that speculation claimed former first lady Michelle Obama or California Gov. Gavin Newsom would be the replacement nominee. Despite the discrepancy in the details, the reality of Biden stepping out has many of them feeling validated.

“It’s shocking how precisely right you can be, right down to the exact timing,” former Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, who was among those who had long suggested Biden would drop out, posted on X on Sunday.

There is little downside to this kind of speculation, which can boost an influencer’s profile whether or not their claims pan out.

“The truth is, you know, sometimes things change. It doesn’t mean that, oh, the conspiracy theorists were right all along. It means everyone was working with the information they knew to be true,” Ryan said.

When speculation does line up with reality — even imperfectly — that creates opportunity to build trust and expand their audience.

“We’ve been seeing that in a lot of different contexts, whether it’s in politics or astrology even on the internet, of people trying to say like, ‘Oh, we knew that this was going to happen,’ and that assigns some sort of authority to your voice,” said Danielle Lee Tomson, research manager at the University of Washington’s Center for an Informed Public.

“Like, ‘I had inside information or some sort of analytic ability to understand that this was going on. So, you know, you can trust me on this future information that I might help you process or make sense of’,” she said.

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The number of unwanted Paris Olympics tickets available for resale has hit more than a quarter of a million, as lack of demand increases concerns just days before Friday’s opening ceremony that many athletes will compete against a backdrop of empty seats. 

The number of listings rose to 271,637 on Tuesday, up from about 180,000 a month ago, a Financial Times analysis of the official resale site shows. The most expensive offers on the resale site are for the opening ceremony, with the best seats priced at €2,970.

Fans wanting to attend the summer games were obliged to buy blocks of tickets for three separate events during the first wave of sales. Organisers said any unwanted tickets could then be resold through the official channel.

However, a lack of demand in the secondary market has left many holding tickets they cannot sell, while organisers have continued to release more tickets. Tickets must be resold at face value, but buyers must pay an additional 10 per cent booking fee, while sellers are hit with a 5 per cent charge.

Users of online forum Reddit have complained about being unable to find buyers for their unwanted tickets. “There are so many athletics tickets on the resale platform,” wrote one user. “I’m feeling bummed that I might be stuck with (good!) tickets. At this point it’s a sunk cost.”

Tony Estanguet, chief executive of the Paris organising committee, said on Sunday that there were still hundreds of thousands of unsold tickets available, in addition to those listed on the official resale site.

Paris 2024 said its approach to ticket sales had been a “major success”, pointing to the 8.85mn “sold or allocated” so far — an Olympic record. About 250,000 tickets had been exchanged via the resale site, the organisers added.

“Given the experience of previous editions, we know fans will have opportunities to purchase tickets throughout the Games,” the organising committee added.

Fans can still buy tickets for prestige events such as the men’s 100 metres final, starting at €295 per person with a restricted view, rising to €980 for Category A seats. About 4,000 tickets, beginning at €900, are still available for Friday night’s opening ceremony, during which a flotilla of boats will ferry athletes down the Seine river in front of a planned audience of about 320,000 spectators. 

Unsold tickets, especially for early rounds, are a regular feature of sporting mega-events, including football World Cups and Olympics. Just over 80,000 of the ticket resale offers listed are for football matches, which begin on Wednesday and will be played at stadiums across France.

More than 1mn tickets were still available on the eve of the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Games. At the most recent games in Tokyo, spectators were barred from attending because of Covid-19 restrictions. 

Although organisers expect 15mn visitors during the Games, hotels and apartment owners looking to capitalise on Olympic demand have already been forced to temper their expectations. Many began lowering prices earlier this year to drum up bookings, while airlines have warned that the Games had suppressed the usual summer appetite for holiday trips to the French capital. Meanwhile, millions of Parisians are expected to flee the city during the Games.

Estanguet, a three-time Olympic gold medal-winning canoeist, said he was “not preoccupied at all” with locals’ level of enthusiasm, pointing to the “millions of people” who had watched the Olympic torch procession across France in recent weeks.

“We’re very confident to say that it’s going to be a wonderful and popular party,” he said. “We will draw our conclusions after the Games.”