planting a 'nazi/white nationalist' in protests and then having the media focus on it seems like such a obvious tactic now that it is making me question every time this kind of thing occurs.

For example, remember the recent election in Virginia where there was a ton of media retweets of a picture of a handful of 'white supremacists' in front of the tour bus for the Republican candidate. The media made a huge deal about it and the reporter who was on the scene made all kinds of absurd tweets about things she 'overheard' them say. However it didn't take long before people found pictures of the 'White Supremacists' working for the Democrat candidates campaign. One was even driving the tour bus!

https://redstate.com/bonchie/2021/10/29/busted-multiple-part...

That was a almost absurdy poorly executed attempt at a political smear but it really opened my eyes to how easy it is to insert bad actors into an event - especially when you have a complicit media.