How a Trump Phone Sales Myth Survived an Entire Week Without Being Fact-Checked

A viral claim about 600,000 Trump Mobile preorders has been debunked to the nth degree, yet it’s still treated as fact by AI chatbots and media outlets—how did this happen?

The 600,000 preorder figure originated from an anonymous X post by Bricktop_NAFO, a meme account with no documented sources. The Associated Press confirmed its coverage of the Trump Mobile "never contained such a number," while Hindustan Times retracted the claim as a typo.

AI chatbots like Gemini and ChatGPT falsely attributed the number to 'Associated Press' and 'Phone Arena' without verification. The Trump Mobile press office has not publicly confirmed preorder numbers since launch.