Fake Trump response to assassination plot spreads online
- Published on September 16, 2024 at 21:48
- 3 min read
- By Daniel GALGANO, AFP USA
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"I don't care who you are, that's funny," says a September 15, 2024 Instagram post from Spike Cohen, the 2020 Libertarian Party vice-presidential nominee.
The post, which accumulated thousands of interactions, includes a supposed screenshot of a post on Trump's social media platform Truth Social that says "0-2," referencing the unsuccessful September and July assassination bids on the former president.
The same claim and image have spread elsewhere on Instagram, X, Facebook, Reddit, YouTube, Telegram and Gettr -- including in Spanish, Portuguese, Arabic, Persian and Chinese.
Prosecutors charged 58-year-old Ryan Wesley Routh with federal gun crimes after he was arrested in connection with a plot to shoot Trump at his West Palm Beach golf course.
US Secret Service agents reportedly spotted a man, later identified as Routh, pointing a rifle out of a tree line while securing the course ahead of Trump. The agents proceeded to open fire on Routh before he fled and was arrested by local police.
However, Trump did not publish a Truth Social post saying "0-2" afterward.
The former president's profile shows no messages matching the screenshots shared online. Neither do archived versions of the page from the day of and after the assassination attempt.
No major US media sources reference a post reading "0-2," despite ample reporting on other messages from his Truth Social page that same day.
Some 10 hours after agents spotted Routh, Trump posted his first actual reaction to the incident, saying he was thankful to law enforcement for thwarting the assassination attempt.
"THE JOB DONE WAS ABSOLUTELY OUTSTANDING. I AM VERY PROUD TO BE AN AMERICAN!" Trump said.
The supposed post shared online also does not match the platform's usual format or font.
Truth Social uses two fonts: Inter and Poppins. Neither matches the lettering in the fake screenshot (archived here).
A side-by-side comparison of the image and a genuine Truth Social post using the same characters shows clear font size and style differences. For example, the "0" in the fake post is flatter on top and has less rounded corners than in the genuine one.
The Google Font pages for Inter and Poppins also appear different from the typeface in the screenshot shared online.
AFP contacted the Trump campaign and Truth Social for comment, but no responses were forthcoming.
AFP has debunked other claims about Donald Trump here.
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