These conspiracy theories circu-
lated widely online as the virus spread,
prompting warnings of an “infodemic”
from public health officials. In late
February, a little-known division of
the U.S. State Department, the Global
Engagement Center, or GEC, said the
Russian government had pushed the
Gates rumor. On May 8, the GEC said it
had identified a network of fake Twitter
accounts being used to spread disinfor-
mation, this time on behalf of China.
The GEC—pronounced “geck” in
bureaucratese—is the federal agency
responsible for fighting online
propaganda from foreign actors.
Created in the waning weeks of the
Obama administration, it is, as Ohio
Republican Senator Rob Portman
has put it, the “central nexus of our
work to create this effective shield
against the falsehoods that threaten
the integrity of our democracy—and
other democracies.”
The consensus view in Washington
is that the GEC, which employs just 120
of the State Department’s 75,000 staff,
hasn’t accomplished much. But Portman
and other supporters believe it turned
a corner in 2019 with the appointmentof Lea Gabrielle, who has the kind of
résumé that plays well in the Trump
White House. She’s a former intelli-
gence officer and Navy pilot who was
until recently a full-time correspondent
for Fox News. Even so, Covid-19 rep-
resents a monumental challenge for her.
It’s one thing for an online campaign to
influence an election, still another for it
to convince people a deadly virus can be
treated with bleach.
Since she took over, the GEC has
undergone something of a turnaround,
persuading an administration that
once seemed hostile to its existenceMay18, 2020Deep inside the Deep State, a tiny agency
is working to stop Covid-19 disinformation.
Under Trump, it hasn’t stood a chanceBy Joshua Brustein
51The U.S.
Department
Of
Conspiracy
Theory
Preparedness