Hundreds of people protested at the Tennessee state capitol today ahead of and during Gov. Bill Haslam's State of the State address. The protest was actually scheduled before President Donald Trump's executive order on refugees last Friday, but the response by the state's GOP leadership — or lack thereof — over the weekend only added fuel to the fire. Protesters swarmed the halls, chanting and singing, forcing legislators to walk a roped-off gauntlet to get to Haslam's address.

But don't worry, guys, those protesters aren't really mad at Trump or Haslam or the Legislature — they were paid to be there!

That, at least, is the theory of state Sen. Paul Bailey (R-Sparta), who tweeted the following on Monday night:

via Twitter

Yes, that does really say, "Despite what the media may report several of the protesters admitted that they had been paid to be at the TN Capitol." Who did they admit that to? Bailey did not return tweets or a phone call to answer.

This is of course a continuation of a fake news rumor floating around conspiracy-minded conservatives that all Trump protesters are being paid by George Soros, because if you're a liberal billionaire whose party lost the election, that's EXACTLY what you would spend money on. (Insert rolling eyes emoji.)

But in this era where facts somehow do not exist, Bailey is not alone — apparently one in three Trump voters think Soros paid all several million women who marched around the world in protest one day after Trump's inauguration. Which means, statistically speaking, Bailey is probably not the only state legislator who believes this. And as Sean Hannity had Newt Gingrich on his show Monday night to talk about this very-much-100-percent-made-up thing, it's only going to get worse.

Fact(ual) Lives Matter, anyone? (Sad face emoji.)