In the summer of 2022, as the bipartisan Jan. 6 committee’s public hearings unfolded, Donald Trump struggled to keep his composure. At one point, the Republican even issued a rambling and conspiratorial 12-page memo intended to prove that his 2020 defeat was the result of election crimes.

The document referenced a movie called “2000 Mules” — described in the memo as a “blockbuster documentary” — a whopping 18 times.

Trump had plenty of company. Indeed, it’s hard to overstate just how much this literally unbelievable film fueled far-right conspiracy theories about the 2020 election. It quickly became a Trump favorite, of course, but many other Republicans — including some in the House and Senate — also took the movie quite seriously, pointing to it was powerful evidence of election irregularities.

They were wrong. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported on a written apology from right-wing commentator Dinesh D’Souza, who was responsible for making the documentary.

The producer of a documentary that falsely accused a metro Atlanta man of committing election fraud during the 2020 election has issued an apology saying his depiction was based on “inaccurate information.” … “I make this apology not under the terms of a settlement agreement or other duress, but because it is the right thing to do, given what we have now learned,” D’Souza wrote on his website over the weekend.

If this sounds at all familiar, the developments come roughly six months after NBC News reported that “2000 Mules” was “pulled by the publisher, Salem Media Group, and the company issued a public apology to a Georgia man who is suing the author and publisher on defamation claims after he was accused of ballot stuffing.”

To be sure, brutal criticisms of the movie are not altogether new. The New York Times characterized the film as “a Big Lie in a New Package,” noting that even some on the right expressed discomfort with the project and its conclusions. The Associated Press said the film is burdened by “gaping holes“; analyses published by The Washington Post characterized its findings as “dishonest“ and “misleading“; The Daily Beast said the movie is “stupid“; and The Bulwark found it to be so bad that it’s unintentionally “hilarious.”

The Bulwark’s piece added that “2000 Mules” is a “tour de force exploring the limits of how many suckers there are willing to pay for fantasy.”

Even former attorney general Bill Barr dismissed the documentary as laughably absurd.

But now, even those responsible for creating and distributing the movie have issued apologies about the film’s claims.

Whether Republicans who touted “2000 Mules” will express similar regrets remains to be seen — though I’m not holding my breath.