Old trucker convoy video misrepresented amid Texas border dispute

"Trucker Convoy heading to the border," says TaraBull, an account that has previously spread misinformation, in a January 25, 2024 post on X, formerly Twitter. "Do you stand with Texas?"

Text over the video says: "The People's Convoy rolling through Texas."

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Screenshot from X taken January 26, 2024

The same clip rocketed across X and other social media platforms, including Facebook and TikTok.

The claims spread amid a standoff between the Biden administration and Texas Republican Governor Greg Abbott over illegal immigration -- a hot-button issue in the 2024 US election. The state has continued fortifying the banks of the Rio Grande despite a Supreme Court ruling that sided with the federal government in allowing Border Patrol agents to remove concertina wire barriers it had erected.

The rising tensions have inspired a parade of truckers who call themselves the "Take Our Border Back" convoy. Backed by far-right figures, the group has primarily organized on Telegram and plans to visit several border states, with the first cohort set to depart January 29 from Virginia (archived here and here).

The convoy had not begun its journey by January 25, and the video published online that day is unrelated.

Reverse image searches reveal the footage has been online since at least February 27, 2022, when it appeared in a TikTok post saying it showed a convoy of trucks on Interstate 40 in the northern panhandle of Texas (archived here).

The 2022 clip appears to be a screen recording of another post. AFP contacted the poster for comment, but no response was forthcoming.

That collection of truck drivers, known as "The People's Convoy," drove from California to the nation's capital. Inspired by similar demonstrations that crippled Canadian cities for weeks, organizers of the rally protested mask mandates, vaccination requirements and shutdowns intended to slow the spread of Covid-19.

On Facebook, one of the People's Convoy organizers said the group is not connected to the Take Our Border Back demonstration (archived here and here).

Filmed in north Texas

The video circulating online is taken from above the trucks. Waving hands appear at the end, suggesting it was filmed from an overpass.

Using Google Maps Street View, AFP geolocated the footage to a stretch of I-40 under an overpass near Groom, Texas (archived here).

The freeways, street signs and vegetation visible on Google Maps Street View match those in the video and indicate the trucks were driving eastbound -- not toward Texas's border with Mexico.

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Screenshot from X taken January 26, 2024, with elements outlined by AFP

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Screenshot from Google Maps Street View taken January 26, 2024, with elements outlined by AFP

Other photos show The People's Convoy on other parts of the interstate, including in Amarillo, Texas.

The planned driving routes for the Take Our Border Back convoy, meanwhile, do not appear to include the Texas stretch of I-40 (archived here).

The convoy's website says its main group planned to depart Virginia Beach on January 29, driving through Jacksonville, Florida, and Baton Rouge, Louisiana, en route to Eagle Pass, Texas -- the site of the standoff between Texas and federal agents (archived here). Roughly 20 vehicles left that morning, journalists tracking the effort reported.

A separate group plans to travel from Dripping Springs, Texas, to Yuma, Arizona, starting February 1, and a third is slated to set off for Yuma from San Ysidro, California on February 3.

AFP has debunked misinformation about previous trucker convoys here, here and here.