Headline Roundup • August 13th, 2024
Fact Check: Crowd in Harris Rally Photo Was Not Faked
Summary from the AllSides News Team
Donald Trump and others accused Kamala Harris of faking a photo from a Michigan rally. But outlets left and right agree: the photo is authentic.
The Details: The photo, which shows Harris disembarking a plane in front of a large, cheering crowd, was originally posted to X on August 7. In the ensuing days, many social media users declared the photo to be fake, including Trump on August 11 via Truth Social. However, as reported by Reuters (Center bias), several photos taken by news outlets and independent photographers show the crowd from different angles, including an aerial shot.
Misleading Reflection: Some X users pointed to a reflection on the plane’s surface which appeared to show an empty space in front of the plane. Daily Mail (Right bias) consulted “AI experts” about the discrepancy, who explained that the surface’s curve “creates an illusion where objects above and below the surface are most visible and dominate the reflection.”
How the Media Covered It: The story was covered mostly by outlets from the center and left. Sources across the spectrum concluded the photo had not been faked. Daily Mail paraphrased their “experts” saying “that it's possible the photo had been heavily filtered and edited,” but noted later in the article that they had assessed only a 4% likelihood that AI had been used.
Featured Coverage of this Story
Adam J. Dewey/Anadolu via Getty Images
Former President Donald Trump has long been obsessed with numbers that signal dominance, like net worth, television ratings, poll results and the attendance figures at his political rallies.
In 2016, Trump pointed to the outsized attendance at his campaign stops to dispute the polls that showed Hillary Clinton leading him on the eve of the election. In 2017, he spent his first full day in office claiming his inauguration crowd was larger than that of former President Barack Obama. (It wasn’t.)
Now Trump is again obsessing over crowd size, inflating the number...
Daily Mail
AI experts say the image of Kamala Harris' rally does show hallmarks of being heavily edited — though this was probably done using basic filters rather than AI.
Donald Trump caused a furor over the weekend after claiming the picture had been 'A.I.'d' to boost the size of Harris' crowd in Michigan and exaggerate her popularity.
The former president and some of his online supports pointed to the unusual lack of crowd reflection on the plane's turbine as evidence the image had been doctored.
Tom Williams / Getty Images
Donald Trump may have coined a new term in his latest false attack on Kamala Harris' presidential campaign. In a pair of posts on Truth Social over the weekend, the former president said that Vice President Kamala Harris "A.I.'d" photos of a huge crowd that showed up to see her speak at a Detroit airport campaign rally last week. "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!" Trump wrote. "She’s a CHEATER. She had NOBODY waiting,...
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