Video does not show Memphis residents stealing National Guard tanks
- Published on September 18, 2025 at 22:51
- 5 min read
- By Bill MCCARTHY, AFP USA
Copyright © AFP 2017-2025. Any commercial use of this content requires a subscription. Click here to find out more.
"Stole 2 tanks from the National Guard in Memphis Tennessee Already!" says text over a video and still photo shared September 14, 2025 on Threads.
Similar posts spread across platforms, including Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and X.
"#Memphis is not a real place," a post on X says. "They sent the National Guard and they already stole a tank."
Trump on September 15 signed an order deploying National Guard troops to Memphis, marking the latest development in the Republican president's crackdown on crime in Democratic-run cities that critics have branded as authoritarian. He said the task force would be a "replica" of one he sent into Washington in August.
But the video circulating online was not taken in Memphis.
"There are no tanks deployed into the streets in Memphis," the National Guard Bureau said in a September 17 email, adding that "no one stole two tanks in Memphis, or elsewhere for that matter."
Reverse image searches traced the clip to June 5, 2020, when it went so viral that even American rap star Meek Mill weighed in on it (archived here and here).
The original posts placed the incident in Atlanta -- hundreds of miles from Memphis -- and some similarly alleged that the tanks were stolen, a claim that gained traction as protests flared nationwide following the May 2020 murder of George Floyd in Minnesota.
But a Heavy.com article from the time, citing the Atlanta Police Department, said the scene actually showed local rappers filming a music production.
The article, which said police were not investigating, mentioned Nefew, an Atlanta rapper with more than 50,000 monthly listeners on Spotify (archived here and here).
On July 9, 2020, Nefew released on YouTube the official music video for his song "Soulja Raggs," which featured fellow local rappers Street Money Boochie and Trouble and showed the trio performing around and on top of the tanks (archived here). The video credits say it was recorded in Atlanta.
AFP matched the rappers and background extras to the people in the clip being misrepresented as a tank robbery in Memphis.
Reached by email September 17, 2025, Nefew confirmed to AFP that the clip spreading online "is my footage from my video shoot."
In a separate September 17 email, Street Money Boochie added: "That's me from the video shoot Soulja Raggs."
He sent AFP a photo of him and Nefew shooting the video from atop one of the armored vehicles.
Additional photos and videos of the rappers and their filming process with the tanks are widely available on Instagram, including on the artists' pages (archived here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here).
AFP geolocated the set to an apartment complex in College Park, Georgia, matching the parking lots, yards and buildings in the music video -- identifiable by their unique doors, roofs and black window shutters -- to Google Street View photos and Google Earth satellite imagery (archived here, here and here).
AFP has debunked other misinformation about Trump's National Guard deployments here and here.
Is there content that you would like AFP to fact-check? Get in touch.
Contact us
