Another day, another spoof site fools the masses!

Every now and again one of those sites slips through the cracks and this time, the outlandish  story about mega-pastor Creflo Dollar endorsing Donald Trump because God came to him in a dream has been discovered to have originated on a satirical news site.

Details below..

Several media outlets took the bait and had a field day yesterday when a fictitious story claiming that God told Creflo Dollar to endorse presidential candidate, Donald Trump went viral.

On 4 May 2016,  the spoof news site Biz Standard News published an article reporting that televangelist and pastor Creflo Dollar, the founder of the non-denominational World Changers Church, had received a “divine message” instructing him to endorse Republican candidate Donald Trump for president:

God came to me in a dream last night and said that Trump is his chosen candidate. God apologized for the mixed messages he was sending. I now know that Trump has been touched by the hand of God.

Trump is like John the Baptist, sent to prepare the world for the return of our Lord, Jesus Christ.

FYI, Biz Standard News (i.e., BS News) is an entertainment web site that does not publish factual stories and they say so in the fine print.

According to SNOPES.com (the internet rumor database) the fictitious report about Creflo’s Trump endorsement went viral this month later after WordOnDaStreet.com mistook the fake news story as real news and rehashed the article on their web site on August 19, 2016.

Soon, media outlets from Atlanta news station WXIA-TV to Centric were falsely reporting that Creflo Dollar had endorsed Donald Trump!

It was funny while it lasted, but apparently Dollar never said a word of that and he wants to set the record straight with the following statement posted to all of his social media account:

Any reports stating that I have endorsed Donald Trump for President are false.

At World Changers Church International, I nor the ministry endorse any political party or candidate; nor do we advise our members who to vote for.

Any claims or statements claiming otherwise are false. This rumor originated on a satirical website and is 100% untrue.

Well boys & girls, now you see how a rumor can turn to fact just by people spreading false information!

What do you think of this anatomy of a rumor report?

Have you ever been fooled by a spoof site?