Old video of NBA fans recirculates amid 'Hands Off' demonstrations
- Published on April 8, 2025 at 21:24
- 3 min read
- By Bill MCCARTHY, AFP USA
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"Huge turnout of protesters in Milwaukee, Wisconsin for 'hands off' rally against Trump and Elon," says an April 5, 2025 post with thousands of interactions on Threads. It shows an overhead view of a crowd packed into a street at night.
Similar posts ricocheted across platforms such as Instagram and X as protesters turned out across the country to denounce Trump's policies and the massive government spending cuts and layoffs directed by the president's billionaire advisor, Elon Musk.
A coalition of activist groups organized "Hands Off" events for April 5 in more than 1,000 cities. The rallies also extended into Europe, where demonstrators in some capitals sounded off over Trump's trade war, which has sent markets nosediving.
The efforts included dozens of gatherings throughout the state of Wisconsin (archived here), where Democrats the week prior had captured a pivotal state Supreme Court seat in an election seen as a proxy for Trump's popularity. The demonstrations included one rally in the city of Milwaukee.
The clip spreading online is not from that rally, however.
Reverse image searches revealed that the footage was originally posted July 20, 2021 by the media site OnMilwaukee (archived here and here). The outlet's post on Facebook tags Fiserv Forum, the arena that plays home to the Milwaukee Bucks.
Led by star Giannis Antetokounmpo, the Bucks defeated the Phoenix Suns in game six of the NBA Finals that night, clinching the franchise's second title. The video was posted almost an hour after the game tipped off, and a large screen can be seen airing it for the crowd.
The "Hands Off" protest that took place nearly four years later was organized near the city's federal building and courthouse on East Wisconsin Avenue, according to news reports and an RSVP page for the event (archived here and here). That location sits across a river and is nearly one mile (1.6 kms) from the stadium.
Another clue the video is old: it shows Punch Bowl Social, an entertainment bar and restaurant in the city's "Deer District" that closed in 2023 (archived here).
AFP has debunked other misinformation about US politics here.
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