Former President Donald Trump was hilariously fact-checked by Vice President Kamala Harris's campaign after claiming Harris used artificial intelligence to make the crowd at her Wednesday campaign rally near Detroit, Michigan, appear larger than it was.
A furious Trump attacked the Harris campaign in the following post on Truth Social:
“Has anyone noticed that Kamala CHEATED at the airport? There was nobody at the plane, and she ‘A.I.’d’ it, and showed a massive ‘crowd’ of so-called followers, BUT THEY DIDN’T EXIST!"
"She was turned in by a maintenance worker at the airport when he noticed the fake crowd picture, but there was nobody there, later confirmed by the reflection of the mirror like finish on the Vice Presidential Plane."
“She’s a CHEATER. She had NOBODY waiting, and the ‘crowd’ looked like 10,000 people! Same thing is happening with her fake ‘crowds’ at her speeches. This is the way the Democrats win Elections, by CHEATING - And they're even worse at the Ballot Box."
"She should be disqualified because the creation of a fake image is ELECTION INTERFERENCE. Anyone who does that will cheat at ANYTHING!"
You can see Trump's post below.
@realDonaldTrump/Truth Social
In a subsequent post, Trump shared an image of Harris's rally crowd along with the following accusation:
“Look, we caught her with a fake ‘crowd.’ There was nobody there!”
You can see his post below.
@realDonaldTrump/Truth Social
Trump was reiterating claims made by conservative commentator Chuck Callesto, who previously gained attention for spreading lies about the January 6, 2021 Capitol insurrection, alleging that various publicly available videos of January 6 had been “censored.”
Harris's campaign, via its Kamala HQ account, followed up with the following fact-check in a post on X, formerly Twitter:
"1) This is an actual photo of a 15,000-person crowd for Harris-Walz in Michigan."
"2) Trump has still not campaigned in a swing state in over a week... Low energy?"
You can see the campaign's post below.
Video footage also backs up the Harris campaign, underscoring Trump's denial.
For instance, liberal activist Ed Krassenstein said Trump's claim is "the most ridiculous, insane, demented thing I've heard in a while." In response, he "stitched together a video featuring 13 different videos and photographs of the exact same event," all of which "come from multiple MSM outlets and multiple independent photographers."
Similarly, another poster shared video evidence with the following message directed at Trump and his supporters:
"I stitched together multiple videos from different angles, including footage from media outlets and random videos taken by attendees. I did this to show these stubborn MAGAs who still believe it’s fake AI generated."
Many joined the Harris campaign in mocking Trump.
Trump's bogus claim came just days after he harped on crowd sizes while answering reporters' questions with his typical lies and distortions during a rambling press conference at his Mar-a-Lago estate.
Trump was asked if he was bothered by the size of the crowds that attended Harris campaign rallies in Philadelphia and Detroit and he responded by attacking the press and insisting that Harris had scarcely more than 2,000 attendees at those events:
"It's so dishonest, the press, and here's a great example. I had in Michigan recently 25,000 people. 25,000 people and we couldn't get them in. In Harrisburg, we had 25,000 people and 20,000 people couldn't get in. We had so many. Nobody ever mentions that."
"When she gets 1,500 people—and I saw it yesterday on ABC when they said the crowd was so big—I have 10 times, 20 times, 30 times the crowd size and they never say the crowd was big. That's why I'm always saying, 'Turn around,' and let me tell you, I'm so glad you asked that."
"It's so terrible when you say she had 1,500 people, 1,000 people and they talk about the enthusiasm. Let me tell you, we have the enthusiasm. The Republican Party — and me as a candidate — but the Republican Party has the enthusiasm. Because people wanna see crime stopped, they wanna see a country that’s respected.”
Trump later claimed the crowd that came to hear him speak on January 6 was the largest he had ever addressed, drawing a comparison to the crowd that gathered for the late Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s famous "I Have a Dream" speech.
He claimed "they said he had a million people but I had 25,000 people and when you look at the exact same picture—and everything's the same because it was the fountains, the whole thing all the way back from Lincoln to Washington—and you look at it, you look at the picture of his crowd, my crowd, we actually had more people."
The Harris campaign later took him to task for these statements, noting that he "hasn't campaigned all week" and "isn't going to a single swing state this week." The campaign added that "facts were hard to track and harder to find in Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago meltdown this afternoon."
The campaign said it had 12,000 and 15,000 people at its respective events in Wisconsin and Michigan, not 2,000 as Trump claimed. It added that the upcoming presidential debate on ABC News is scheduled for September 10, not September 25, as Trump previously claimed.
It also noted that people have spoken to bigger crowds than Donald Trump has, namely Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and anyone who has attended events like Lollapalooza, Coachella, and The World Cup. Moreover, the campaign criticized Trump for comparing the crowds on January 6 to the crowds at King's "I Have a Dream Speech" and that the insurrection, where five police officers died, was obviously not a "peaceful transfer of power."
