NEW YORK (AP) — Donald Trump looked directly into the camera in a black T-shirt. Giving a side-eye in a suit and striped tie. Throbbing in an orange jumpsuit.
Although Trump did not actually take one during his booking and hearing, similar images purporting to show a mug shot of the former president circulated online on Tuesday. in Manhattan Criminal Court.
Fabricated images are created using at least some artificial intelligence text-to-image generatorsSome social media users have been fooled by the visual icon Trump has been charged with 34 felonies. Falsifying business records.
Trump, who has admitted to all allegations that he raised the money from his own fake mug shot, said in an email to supporters on Tuesday that his campaign plastered on a T-shirt.
Check out the facts here.
Claim: Images circulating on social media show mugshots of the former president captured on Tuesday.
Facts: These images are created or manipulated to look like booking photos.
After he was taken into custody on Tuesday, Trump was fingerprinted as part of the booking process, but his mug shot was not taken, according to two law enforcement officials. Officials could not publicly discuss details of the process and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.
However, more than 10 fake images purporting to show a police photo of Trump circulated across Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and TikTok on Tuesday, some more realistic than others.
“From 1-10 How happy are you about Trump’s arrest?” wrote a Twitter user who shared a fake booking photo in a post that has been liked more than 13,000 times.
Images circulating on social media depict the former president in outfits ranging from a suit and tie to a T-shirt, against numbered walls or gray and white backgrounds.
Trump’s campaign also fabricated its own mugshot, emailing supporters an image of a T-shirt with the words “Not Guilty.” It was created by editing a slate with elevation markers and dummy reservation details Existing headshot of the former President.
Some users sharing other variants admitted they were created using AI tools – which were behind last month’s flood of faked images. It reportedly shows Trump being violently arrested by New York City police officers.
Many of the fake mugshots had signs of artificial artwork, such as silly numbered text in the background instead of the elevation chart often seen in booking photos.
While some posts are shared as obvious jokes, AI images “lend themselves to context-degradation,” said Sam Gregory, executive director of Witness, a nonprofit that works to use video technology for human rights.
That is, if they lose their initial context, such as parody or satire, images can spread as misinformation or misinformation.
“Like other manipulated media, the speed of sharing outstrips the speed of fact-checking,” Gregory said, and “people share what they want to believe.”
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Associated Press writers Michael Balsamo and Colin Long in Washington contributed to this report.
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It’s part of AP’s effort to address widely shared misinformation, including working with outside agencies and organizations to add factual context to false content circulating online. Learn more about fact-checking at AP.
