The perpetrators are more likely to be marketing companies and/or people with a financial incentive to undermine science conducting research on virality.

The people in the "government" already have power. There's no real incentive to pull off a scheme like this instead of acting on the political motives that had you run for office to begin with. It's like spending all day cooking a nice dinner, then when it's done, looking up recipe ideas online instead of eating.

There are lots of companies in the world who benefit from undermining science. The most obvious being energy, healthcare, and food providers. Government regulation is a huge burden in these sectors and regulations are almost always the result of pesky scientific research.