Uncommon Knowledge: White House meme warriors, meet reality

A protest against immigration raids in Minnesota over the weekend culminated in federal agents leading civil rights attorney Nekima Levy Armstrong away in handcuffs. Hours later, the official White House account posted what looked like the same arrest photo—except her face was now covered in tears. The White House confirmed the image was fake. Asked for comment, the office pointed to a staffer’s response: “Enforcement of the law will continue. The memes will continue.”

Will the memes continue on TikTok? Yes, but with what the administration describes as “trusted” oversight. TikTok’s Chinese owners have reached an agreement that will keep the app operating in the United States, ending a long-running dispute that began during President Donald Trump’s first term over national security concerns, including the potential for young users to be fed misinformation. Oracle, co-founded by Trump ally Larry Ellison, will host U.S. data and provide the oversight of algorithm retraining. Critics fear the arrangement could allow partisan views to become more prominent.

By contrast, polls show broad, bipartisan demand for guardrails on AI-generated political media and disclosure labels on manipulated content. Yet the administration’s official feeds keep pushing stylized fabrications—from a fake TIME cover crowning the president “KING,” to a July 2025 Superman meme, to the doctored “crying arrestee.” The public is learning to fact-check. The White House, it seems, is not.

Common Knowledge

Civil liberties groups are often alarmed about internet restrictions. When Republican Governor Ron DeSantis signed Florida’s HB 3, which bans under-14s from social-media accounts and requires parental consent for 14- and 15-year-olds, the ACLU of Florida called it “a broad censorship law that stifles the freedom of expression online.”

DeSantis said that doing nothing was not an option. “Social media harms children in a variety of ways… HB 3 gives parents a greater ability to protect their children,” he said. A federal appeals court has since allowed Florida to begin enforcement while litigation proceeds.

On TikTok, left-leaning critics have voiced concerns about the forced sale. “Donald Trump’s TikTok deal looks like crony capitalism,” read a headline in The New Yorker in September.

“My worry all along is that we may have traded fears of foreign propaganda for the reality of domestic propaganda,” Anupam Chander, a law and technology professor at Georgetown University, told The New York Times.

National-security hawks on the right have called for firmer action. “TikTok is a weapon of the Chinese Communist Party,” warned the Heritage Foundation. “A halfway deal that leaves a backdoor open for Beijing… should be rejected.”

Uncommon Knowledge

Independent media monitors from Poynter and elsewhere say the administration used AI or manipulated imagery at least 14 times in 2025 on official or semi-official channels. These include an AI-altered photo mocking Democratic Representative Jimmy Gomez as “crying,” an AI image of Trump as the pope, and another AI image of “Superman Trump.”

Americans aren’t naïfs about such things. They are increasingly skeptics. Surveys fielded in 2024–25 show large majorities across parties wanting rules on AI-generated political content and mandatory disclosure labels. Pew found growing anxiety about AI’s role in misinformation, while an Ipsos/Reuters poll showed a bipartisan tilt toward regulation. Voters are not clamoring for more state-sourced deepfakes. They’re asking for the opposite.

Those fears aren’t reflected in the courts. Florida is the only U.S. state actually enforcing a statewide prohibition on social-media accounts for children under 14, thanks to an Eleventh Circuit order allowing HB 3 to take effect pending appeal. Comparable statutes in other states have been blocked. Ohio’s parental-consent law was permanently enjoined; Utah’s restrictions were preliminarily enjoined; Arkansas’s 2023 law was permanently enjoined and its 2025 rewrite is already facing a fresh injunction request.

Beyond U.S. borders, the pace is much quicker. Australia’s national under-16 ban took effect on December 10, 2025. Within days, platforms reported around 4.7 million underage accounts deactivated, removed or restricted. The U.K. may follow with its own ban this year.

The disconnect is disconcerting. The TikTok deal’s premise is that algorithms are too powerful to leave in the hands of a foreign adversary; the Florida law’s premise is that certain feeds are too addictive for preteens without parental consent. Both are arguments for stewardship. Yet the White House’s own feeds keep feeding the public fakes. As long as America is governed by the meme, it will keep colliding with reality.

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