By: Rajini KG
July 12 2023
Old videos from 2022 rallies shared to claim Trump is getting more support for 2024 Presidential bid
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Fact-Check
The Verdict Misleading
The election campaigns held for the U.S. midterm election 2022 were reshared as recent rallies held for the 2024 Presidential election.
Context
A video posted on Instagram on June 29, 2023, titled "Make America Great Again Trump 2024," misrepresents footage of Biden and Trump rallies to suggest that Donald Trump is receiving more support for his 2024 presidential campaign.
The text on the video reads, "Donald Trump and Joe Biden Both held rallies in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, this week. Here is what they looked like back to back. Incredible." In the video, we can see a large crowd cheering on as Trump walks towards the podium, followed by a clip of Biden addressing a much smaller group. The archive of the post can be found here.
However, the clips in the video are from Trump and Biden’s 2022 midterm election campaigns, from different locations, not from 2023.
In Fact
We found that old videos from 2022 have been edited together to claim that Trump has received more support in his recent rallies than Biden has.
Through a reverse image search, we found that the video was shared with the same text in 2022. Benny Johnson, an American political commentator and YouTuber, shared a similar video on September 4, 2022, with the caption, "Donald Trump and Joe Biden Both held rallies in Wilkes-Barre Pennsylvania this week. Here is what they looked like back to back. Incredible."
By searching for Trump and Biden rallies help in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, we found videos from 2022 that match the footage shown in the viral video.
The footage of Trump’s speech comes from a September 3, 2022, event at Mohegan Sun Arena at Casey Plaza in Wilkes-Barre Township. One video on YouTube, titled "Donald Trump Rally Wilkes Barre, PA 09-03-2022," was shot at the same venue as the viral clip but from a different angle. A large American flag is displayed behind the stage, and the venue setup matches the viral video.
C-SPAN states that Trump gave a campaign speech in support of Pennsylvania candidate for the U.S. Senate, Dr. Mehmet Oz, and gubernatorial candidate Doug Mastriano, ahead of the 2022 midterm election in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania.
The footage of Biden is taken from a video from August 30, 2022, when Biden visited Wilkes University in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, to promote his administration's “Safer America Plan.” Biden’s speech from this event matches the viral video, as does the venue setup. The transcript of the entire speech is available in a White House press release.
According to AP News, Trump has begun his election rallies for the 2024 Presidential bid. In March 2023, he held rallies in Waco, Texas, and on July 1, he held a rally in South Carolina. U.S. President Joe Biden held his first major election rally for his second term on June 17, 2023, in Philadelphia.
The Verdict
The viral video of Biden and Trump's speeches uses old footage from and is not from 2023. The footage is unrelated to the 2024 Presidential election rally, and the video has been shared with a false narrative to mislead people. Therefore, we have marked this claim as misleading.