By: Arron Williams
November 10 2022
A Twitter post claiming Jimmy Carter's death was from a hoax account posing as the Carter Center. There are no official reports of Carter's death.
Context
On November 10, 2022, Twitter account @CarterCenterUS claimed that the 39th president of the U.S., Jimmy Carter, was dead, with an official announcement on the way. The account had over 13,000 followers at the time of the post.
In Fact
The claim of Jimmy Carter's death is baseless. The account @CarterCenterUS was an imitation account posing as the real Carter Center. The account has since been suspended for violating Twitter's rules. The account was created by Tommaso DeBenedetti, who is known to create Twitter hoaxes and false tweets. The account itself announced it was an imitation following the tweet that claimed Carter's death.
A similar hoax that claimed British novelist Kazuo Ishiguro had died was investigated by Logically earlier this year and found to be false. This claim was also allegedly created by DeBenedetti in a similar fashion, whereby a parody Twitter account imitated the Faber Books publishing house. DeBenedetti is an Italian national known for hoaxes relating to famous personalities, and this previous fact check quoted a Guardian report that described Tommaso as "one of the world's most creative and successful fake tweeters."
The Carter Center's official Twitter, @CarterCenter, hasn't announced or mentioned Carter's death. Additionally, there are no reputable news sources that have reported or announced Carter's death. Furthermore, in September 2022, the Carter Center published an article to celebrate his 98th birthday on October 1, 2022. The article stated, "The Carter Center is engaging the public in a weeklong, virtual celebration of a life dedicated to service and making the world a better place."
The Verdict
The claim of Carter's death came from a hoax account allegedly created by DeBenedetti, a user known for fake tweets. Furthermore, there have been no official reports or announcements that Carter has died. Therefore, we have marked this claim as false.