The Aporia · Conspiracy theories and the American presidency

Historian Stephen F. Knott discusses his book "Conspirator in Chief" on "The Takeout," where he explores how U.S. presidents have historically been involved with conspiracy theories. The piece focuses specifically on Knott's argument about the prevalence of such behavior among American leaders.

Written locally by qwen2.5:14b on 2026-09-18, using this article's own text rather than the other coverage of the same event (that is the story summary below).

AI analysis runs on qwen2.5:14b, locally

Story summary

Historian Stephen F. Knott has written a new book titled "Conspirator in Chief," which explores how U.S. presidents have often engaged with and propagated conspiracy theories over time. In an interview on CBSNews.com, Knott discusses his findings, highlighting the historical pattern of presidential involvement in spreading such theories. The book aims to provide insight into the role that misinformation has played in American political history from a leadership standpoint.

Written for “Conspiracy Theories And Presidency” on 2026-09-18, grounded in this article and the 0 other(s) covering the same event.

Why this leaning score

This article does not take a side on a contested political question, so it has no leaning score. That is an answer rather than a gap: a match report or a rescue can be warmly or critically written without being left or right, and scoring it anyway is how approval of a subject gets recorded as a political position.

No political leaning scored for article 17316 · logged 2026-09-18

Signals How these are calculated →

Claims extracted

claim-shaped sentences

Uncertain

0 of 2 hedged

Leaning

not political

takes no side on a contested political question

Correction & hedging signals

70.8

corrections and hedging in what we collected; not a measure of accuracy

Outlets on this story

Politics

Narrative spread

articles carrying this framing

Story

📰 Conspiracy Theories And Presidency

Politics · 1 article(s) covering the same event.

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Publisher

CBS News · 650 article(s) · 3 correction(s) detected

Running correction rate · 3 correction(s)

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Who wrote this

No reporter is named on this article.

Topics

Subjects

Knott PERSON · 1× Stephen F. Knott PERSON · 1×

Narrative

In his new book "Conspirator in Chief," historian Stephen F. Knott argues that there is a long history of those who occupy the Oval Office engaging in conspiracy theories.

framing: assertive · carried by 1 article(s) · first seen 2026-09-18

2026-09-18 · CBS News

Conspiracy theories and the American presidency · assertive framing

Claims (2 extracted, 0 hedged)

In his new book "Conspirator in Chief," historian Stephen F. Knott argues that there is a long history of those who occupy the Oval Office engaging in conspiracy theories. asserted

who → argue → theories

Knott joins "The Takeout" to discuss. asserted

Knott → join → Takeout

Conspiracy theories and the American presidency

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