Kamala Harris was a man, she was not allowed to run for president of USA and more, and more: since it became clear that Joe Biden is withdrawing from the presidential race, fake news about Harris has been gaining momentum on the web.
"Today is today. And yesterday was today yesterday. Tomorrow will be today tomorrow. So live today so that the future may be today, because the past is just as much today as it is tomorrow." A video of these confusing words spoken by US Vice President Kamala Harris is circulating on social media these days. However, it is not real, but manipulated, writes the German public television ARD.
The original video is from a speech Harris gave at a political event in support of reproductive rights at Howard University in Washington. A transcript of her entire speech can be viewed online. These sentences are not there, nor are they in the original video of the event.
British fact-checking organization Full Fact
explains that the audio channel of the video has been changed. Artificial intelligence was also most likely used to synchronize the fake sound with Harris's lip movements. This video, as well as other false claims about the vice president of the United States, spread very quickly after Joe Biden announced that he was ending his campaign for a second term and supporting Harris for the Democratic nomination.
Harris is eligible to run
Conspiracy theories are also spreading in connection with the origin of Kamala Harris, notes ARD. A similar thing happened to former US President Barack Obama. These theories claim that Harris was not even eligible to be president of the United States because only those born in the United States are eligible to run for president.
Even before the previous presidential election, this conspiracy theory was spread by Trump's supporters, and even by himself. In fact, Kamala Harris was born in Oakland, in the state of California, writes ARD. That is why there is no doubt that she can run for president. And the fact that her father was born in Jamaica and her mother in India does not change that.
Her vaccination against coronavirus was not staged
Other false claims related to Harris date back to the pandemic. For example, there were repeated publications, according to which the vice president was not vaccinated against Covid-19. A video showing Harris receiving the vaccine is being used as "evidence" - when zooming in, it looks like the syringe has no needle. However, this is due to the poor quality of the video, where something as small as a needle cannot be seen clearly when the picture is enlarged many times.
In the photos taken by photojournalists of the news agencies, which are of much better quality, it is clearly visible that Harris was injected with the vaccine against Covid-19, notes ARD. The American vice president was vaccinated with the "Modern" preparation, and the vaccination was broadcast live on American television.
Manipulated photo with Jeffrey Epstein
Another disinformation campaign involved a doctored image that allegedly showed Kamala Harris posing for a photo with Jeffrey Epstein. He was arrested in July 2019, ARD recalls. The businessman, who had connections to the most influential circles in the US, was accused of sexually assaulting many women and girls, including minors, and of inducing them to prostitution. About a month after Epstein's arrest, he was found dead in his cell. The official information is that he committed suicide.
The photo of Epstein and Kamala Harris next to each other has been manipulated. In the real photo, the US vice president poses with her husband Douglas Emhoff, not with Epstein.
More disinformation about Harris?
The fact that there is a lot of misinformation being spread about Harris was also discussed in the previous election. A study analyzed over 300,000 social media posts about 13 women in politics. Harris was attacked in over 3/4 of those posts, ARD said.
According to the authors of the study, much of the misinformation now being used against Kamala Harris is similar to that which was also directed at Barack and Michelle Obama - for example, that she is not eligible to be vice president because of her background. Other false claims are also circulating - for example, that Harris had a secret plan to wrest power from Biden as early as 2020. And perhaps the most incredible claim is that the vice president of the United States is actually a man.
Researchers found two important factors driving misinformation about Harris - her skin color and ethnicity, as well as her gender. The harassment that women of color face online is much more serious than that which befalls white women.