Ahead of election, experts warn Hurricane Helene misinformation is 'just the beginning'

On Friday, billionaire Elon Musk took to his social media platform, X, to share an unsubstantiated claim with his 200 million followers, alleging that FEMA was deliberately obstructing relief efforts for Hurricane Helene.

In the post, which quickly garnered over 40 million views, Musk claimed that FEMA was "actively blocking citizens who try to help" by "blocking shipments and seizing goods" intended for delivery to those in need. FEMA and local officials have denied these allegations, labeling them as false.

Less than an hour after Musk made his post, former President Donald Trump, whom Musk has endorsed and campaigned for, amplified those unfounded claims on his own social media platform, Truth Social, to his more than 7 million followers.

The unsubstantiated claims spread by Musk and Trump have raised concerns among experts who warn that the spread of misinformation is "only going to get worse" as Election Day approaches.

"I think we are in for a very dangerous situation this election," said Alex Mahadevan, director of the Media Wise digital media literacy project at the nonprofit Poynter Institute for Media Studies.

"I can only hope that supervisors of elections are prepared to pre-bunk, to get out in front of a lot of this misinformation, [and] that they have a communication plan," Mahadevan said.

Sam Woolley, a disinformation researcher and author at the University of Pittsburgh, echoed those concerns about Musk, who he accused of being a leading figure in the spread of misinformation. Since taking over X, Woolley said, Musk has disregarded content moderation and instead pushed "disinformation narratives" that support Trump.

"Right now, we're kind of in a race to the bottom and that race is being led by Elon Musk," Woolley said.

Woolley told ABC News that disinformation and misinformation surrounding politics and events are "only going to get more pointed" and suggested that people should "be on their high guard."

"The goal of the people spreading this kind of false content is to inflame tensions, to make you angry and or to make you more apathetic about the voting process," Woolley said. "And so my call to action for people is, don't let that happen. The most important thing in a democracy is that we all are involved and that we all cast our vote."

Writing on X, Musk also falsely accused FEMA of having "used up its budget ferrying illegals into the country," calling it "treason." Hours later at a town hall event, Trump repeated those baseless accusations, falsely telling his supporters that FEMA was "missing a billion dollars that they gave to migrants coming into our country. Some of them are murderers. Some of them are drug dealers."

The White House has been hitting back at the misinformation, stressing that funding for migrant services is run through a separate spigot at Customs and Border Patrol and is not related to FEMA's disaster recovery efforts. FEMA has also created a fact-checking page on its website to address the false claims.

Back in 2019, when he was president, Trump used FEMA's disaster fund for migrant programs at the border. According to a FEMA monthly report, $38 million was given to Immigration and Customs Enforcement in August of that year.

Disinformation experts and immigration advocates called the posts by Musk and Trump "blatant falsehoods" that put "vulnerable immigrant communities in greater danger."

"We've heard from President Trump that immigrants are voting illegally, that they are stealing FEMA money, that they are eating family pets -- and this is where the facts rebut the fiction," Krish O'Mara Vignarajah, the president of Global Refuge told ABC News.

"These kinds of blatant falsehoods are designed to divide the American public, and it seems like it's for nothing more than political gain," Vignarajah said. "Not only do they undermine public trust, these lies really put vulnerable immigrant communities in greater danger."

Ohio officials have said the baseless claims about immigrants and pets have led to dozens of bomb threats and other threats of violence targeting the Haitian community, which has forced Springfield law enforcement officials to evacuate schools, hospitals and other city facilities.

In the wake of the unsubstantiated claims about FEMA and Hurricane Helene, a top FEMA official told ABC News the recent false claims are keeping people from registering for FEMA assistance.

"The reality is that misinformation and falsehoods have a real impact upon people's lives," Woolley said.