It turns out that when you spend every day parroting the most asinine conspiracies and narratives imaginable, people lose faith in your ability to play it straight pretty quickly. That’s the situation that America’s propaganda media found themselves in this year, as their credibility amongst the public hit the lowest level in recorded history.

For anyone who’s paid attention to their coverage of the 2025 “news” cycle, it’s not hard to see why. From running cover for leftist violence to gaslighting Americans about their role in the cover-up over Joe Biden’s ailing health, the corporate media’s bid to hide the truth was nothing short of remarkable.

So, as a public service, The Federalist has compiled a list of the top 10 biggest hoaxes run by our reality-deprived media throughout the past year. In no particular order, here they are.

Elon the ‘Fascist’

It didn’t take long after President Trump was sworn back into office for the media to pick up right where they left off after his first term.

While celebrating alongside Trump supporters at a post-inauguration event, X owner Elon Musk delivered remarks to attendees, in which he thanked them for making Trump’s victory possible. With his hand over his heart, the tech mogul then pointed to the crowd and said, “My heart goes out to you. It is thanks to you that the future of civilization is assured.”

Media hacktivists quickly leapt into action to falsely characterize the hand gesture as a “fascist” or “Nazi” salute. This included outlets like PBS News, which wrote on X, “Billionaire Elon Musk gave what appeared to be a fascist salute Monday while making a speech at the post-inauguration celebration for President Donald Trump at the Capital One Arena.”

Anti-Hegseth Campaign

From the day President Trump tapped him to lead the Pentagon, Pete Hegseth has been under a barrage of media smear campaigns and hoaxes. Throughout his Senate confirmation battle to become America’s next war secretary, the media ran endless stories featuring anonymous sources alleging wrongdoing at his prior places of employment and dishonest hit pieces about his personal life — all to keep him from being confirmed.

Even after failing to prevent Hegseth’s confirmation, the media have shifted their focus to ousting him from the position. Throughout the past year, these efforts have included pushing the Signalgate dud, manufacturing a “constitutional crisis” about a Pentagon-led prayer service, elevating the voices of unnamed disgruntled officers to trash Hegseth, and — most recently — fomenting a hoax surrounding the military’s strikes on drug-smuggling boats in the Caribbean.

Wait … Joe Biden Wasn’t OK After All?

Despite outlets like The Federalist reporting on it for years, America’s propaganda press didn’t just ignore Joe Biden’s clear cognitive decline — they actively participated in the cover-up. At every turn of his presidency, the media did everything possible to run interference for the doddering Delaware Democrat and preserve their party’s political power.

It was only after Biden disgracefully exited stage right that media hacks like Jake Tapper felt it was OK to acknowledge what those who aren’t regime simps have long known to be true about the now-former president. Earlier this year, the CNN talking head and Axios’ Alex Thompson embarked on a media tour to hawk their new book, which promises readers an inside look at the Democrat-led effort they participated in to hide Biden’s decline from the American public.

If that’s not gaslighting at its absolute worst, then I don’t what is.

A ‘Maryland Man’

Given their willingness to turn a blind eye to the border crisis under the Biden administration, it came as no surprise when the media ran to sow falsehoods about President Trump’s immigration enforcement efforts.

One of the most prominent examples of this came to a head with the deportation of Salvadoran national Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a credibly accused MS-13 gang member and wife-beater. Rather than inform their readers that Garcia is an illegal alien and detail his reported criminal record, the media orchestrated a full-blown disinformation campaign to deceive Americans into believing the Trump administration abducted an unsuspecting “Maryland man” off the streets.

One Associated Press headline read, “El Salvador President Bukele says he won’t be releasing a Maryland man back to the US.,” while an NBC News piece partially read, “El Salvador won’t return Maryland man to the U.S. …”

The disinformation op was but one of many that media hacks ran throughout the year to smear and vilify immigration enforcement operations throughout the country.

Whitewashing the Russiagate Scandal

The damaging, years-long Russia collusion hoax would not have been possible without the active participation of America’s corrupt media. So, when explosive records on the subject were released earlier this year, it wasn’t exactly shocking that these so-called “defenders of democracy” immediately moved to sweep it all under the rug.

Declassified by the Trump administration, these damning documents showed how Obama-era intel leaders included uncorroborated intel in a 2017 intelligence report ordered by President Obama that parroted the false claim that Russia “aspired” for Trump to win the 2016 election. Not only was this and other unsubstantiated intel included at the behest of officials like then-CIA Director John Brennan, but intel contradicting that central claim was left out of the report altogether.

[EXCLUSIVE: ‘This Should NOT Be Included’ — Read Intel Officials’ Objections To ‘Extremely Sketchy’ Steele Dossier]

The propaganda press wasted little time in downplaying the scandal it helped to create. From running dishonest headlines to spewing outright falsehoods, the brazen hackery was a sight to behold.

[READ: Shameless Accomplice Media Spins Again To Cover For Obama And Friends]

(Meanwhile, The Federalist — which conducts actual journalism — was awarded the 2025 Dao Grand Prize for Investigative Journalism for its work exposing the Russia collusion hoax.)

Sydney Sweeney’s Good Jeans

It’s hard to imagine how even the most deranged members of the corporate press could turn an ad for denim jeans into a controversy about “racism.” And yet, they somehow found a way to do it.

When actress Sydney Sweeney modeled for American Eagle’s summer jeans line, shrieking leftist harpies and other media numskulls immediately rushed to characterize the ad campaign as one that promotes “racism,” “white supremacy,” “eugenics,” and pretty much every other left-wing outrage word you can think of. And then, after being inevitably mocked for their stupid responses, masculinity-challenged media flakes like David French were there to tell us that it was actually those darn right-wingers who made up the entire controversy.

Smearing Charlie Kirk

If you thought the barbaric assassination of a young husband and father of two small children would be enough for the media to change their grotesque ways, then you are gravely mistaken. Almost immediately after the murder of Christian and conservative speaker Charlie Kirk, the despicable ghouls allowed to permeate cable news wasted no time in smearing him.

Less than an hour after news broke that Kirk had been shot, MSNBC (now MS NOW) correspondent Katy Tur characterized the TPUSA founder as a “divisive” and “polarizing” figure and attempted to frame the shooting around gun access and Utah’s “permissive” firearm laws. She furthermore appeared to express more concern about the political fallout for her Democrat allies than for Kirk, saying, “You can imagine the [Trump] administration using this as a justification for something.”

Meanwhile Tur’s then-colleague Matthew Dowd initially suggested that Kirk could’ve been shot as the result of a “supporter shooting their gun off in celebration,” and then pivoted to smearing Kirk as “one of the most divisive, especially divisive younger figures … who is constantly sort of pushing this sort of hate speech … aimed at certain groups.” (Dowd was later fired for his repulsive conduct.)

[READ: Debunking The Top 5 Lies The Left Is Spreading About Charlie Kirk After His Death]

The smears were two of the numerous media-led character assassination campaigns against Kirk that occurred in the wake of his assassination.

Excusing Leftist Violence

The assassination of Charlie Kirk. The attempted assassinations of Donald Trump. Attacks on ICE agents. The destruction of Tesla cars and dealerships. The firebombing of pro-life centers. The 2020 Black Lives Matter “summer of love” riots. The mafia-like murder of a health care CEO. The 2017 congressional baseball shooting. The attempted killing of Brett Kavanaugh. Transgender-led terror attacks on Christians.

These are but a few of the many acts of leftist violence to plague America in recent years — a problem that keeps getting worse by the minute. But according to our propaganda media, this is all just a figment of conservatives’ imagination.

[READ: While Media Denied Leftist Violence After Kirk Murder, Three More Left-Wing Attacks Happened]

When they’re not trying to downplay or “both sides” the issue, these so-called “journalists” are busy victim-blaming Republicans for getting attacked by Democrats’ wacko footsoldiers. And in the case of outlets like The Economist, they’ll even report out garbage studies conducted by literal Antifa to push the bogus narrative that political violence is really a right-wing problem.

Democrat Lawfare? Never Heard of It

If you pay close enough attention, you may notice a slight difference in the way the media covered the Biden administration and other Democrat prosecutors’ lawfare against Donald Trump and how they responded to the Trump administration moving to hold Dems’ corrupt allies accountable for their allegedly unlawful actions.

When Biden and Co. attempted to imprison Republicans’ 2024 presidential candidate on the eve of a major election, the “democracy dies in darkness” crowd could not have been more ecstatic. This unprecedented lawfare, media entities like The New York Times editorial board reasoned, was necessary to preserve what they professed to be the rule of law.

Yet when the Trump administration moved to hold figures like James Comey and John Bolton accountable for their allegedly unlawful actions, many of these same hacks have (unsurprisingly) been singing a different tune. Throughout the past year, they have twisted themselves into pretzels to deceive the American public into believing that this has nothing to do with the corrupt activities of such individuals and everything to do with Trump exacting “political retribution” against his enemies — all while ignoring their allies’ past lawfare against the president.

War on SCOTUS

The media’s bid to discredit the U.S. Supreme Court’s conservative justices is not a new phenomenon. But this year, it took on a new phase.

With left-wing activists and groups filing lawsuits against the Trump administration at every turn, predominantly Democrat-appointed judges have been quick to grant these actors’ requests to issue overreaching injunctions designed to grind the president’s agenda to a halt. Several of these cases have since made their way up to the Supreme Court, which has stopped many of the legally dubious orders from going into effect while litigation continues in the lower judiciary.

Seizing the opportunity, the media have used the conservative justices’ willingness to stifle this judicial coup as part of their campaign to destroy the court. These regime mouthpieces have since adopted the bogus narrative that, by following the law, SCOTUS is doing the bidding of Trump, whom they gleefully paint as a lawless authoritarian.

“The Supreme Court Is Trump’s Partner in Crimes Against America,” a September Rolling Stone headline read.

“The overwhelming evidence that the Supreme Court is on Donald Trump’s team,” blared a September Vox article.

Shawn Fleetwood is a staff writer for The Federalist and a graduate of the University of Mary Washington. He is a co-recipient of the 2025 Dao Prize for Excellence in Investigative Journalism. His work has been featured in numerous outlets, including RealClearPolitics, RealClearHealth, and Conservative Review. Follow him on Twitter @ShawnFleetwood