A former Oakland Athletics All-Star's Instagram bio now links to the work of a discredited conspiracy theorist and far-right political activist, the latter of which published a supposed exposé on the efficacy – or lack thereof – of the COVID-19 vaccines on Monday.
Blake Treinen, an All-Star for Oakland in 2018 who's now a reliever with the Los Angeles Dodgers, included links to Mike Lindell's website and a "bombshell" from James O’Keefe's Project Veritas as of Monday night. SFGATE's Alex Shultz first reported on Treinen's Instagram bio on Monday afternoon, noting his bio is "many steps beyond" the "right-leaning subject matter" Treinen typically posts about on his Instagram stories.
Lindell has made repeated, false and easily disproved claims that former President Donald Trump won the 2020 presidential election. The MyPillow CEO was named in a $1.3 billion lawsuit by Dominion Voting Systems earlier this year and predicted in August that Trump would regain the presidency in 2021. He was permanently suspended from Twitter in January.
Claims of widespread voter fraud in the 2020 election remain unfounded, and Joe Biden remains president.
Treinen’s bio also included a link in which people can sign up for the email distribution list of Project Veritas' "COVID-19 Vaccine Exposed" series. Run by James O'Keefe, Project Veritas has a history of hyping and releasing highly edited videos, often aiming to undermine liberal politicians and groups.
Twitter in April permanently banned O'Keefe's account "for violating Twitter Rules on platform manipulation and span." Project Veritas' account was permanently suspended for repeatedly posting other people’s private information.
More Americans have now died of COVID-19 than during the 1918 influenza pandemic, according to data released Monday by Johns Hopkins University and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Over 675,000 Americans died of the virus as of Monday.
Just 7,653 deaths were reported among people who received the COVID-19 vaccine as of Sept. 13. Reported deaths don’t mean the vaccine was the cause, and the CDC’s review of autopsies, death certificates and medical records hasn’t established a causal relationship with the three vaccines approved for use by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
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