IN SHORT: In a 2023 video, former US president Donald Trump slammed “left-wing lunatics” who he said were trying to bring back Covid lockdowns ahead of the country’s 2024 election. The video has resurfaced in 2024 with the claim that Trump was warning of impending lockdowns because of the mpox outbreak. But there’s no truth to the claim.
Note: This report includes details about a developing news story. Information was, as far as possible, correct at the time of publication but may change rapidly.
“Trump warns about lockdowns and election fraud with monkeypox. Refuse to comply!” reads a post on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter.
The post features a video of Donald Trump, who served as president of the United States from 2017 to 2021. He is seeking a second term in the country’s November 2024 elections.
Mpox, the disease formerly known as monkeypox, is caused by the monkey virus. Its symptoms include fever, skin rash and tiredness. It is transmitted through close contact with an infected person or animal.
In the video, Trump can be heard saying:
The left-wing lunatics are trying very hard to bring back Covid lockdowns and mandates with all of their sudden fearmongering about the new variants that are coming. You know what else is coming? An election. They want to start the Covid hysteria so they can justify more lockdowns … They rigged the 2020 election, and now they're trying to do the same thing all over again by rigging the most important election in the history of our country, the 2024 election, even if it means trying to bring back Covid. But they will fail because we will not let it happen.
The same video and claim can be found here, here and here.
On 14 August, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the rise in mpox cases a global public health emergency. As of 22 August, more than 14,000 cases of mpox and 457 deaths had been reported in affected countries.
In response to the Covid-19 pandemic in early 2020, many countries imposed lockdown measures, such as the closing down of businesses and schools and curfews.
But did Trump really warn the world of looming lockdowns over the mpox outbreak? We checked.
Ignore old video
A Google reverse image search of a keyframe from the video led us to an August 2023 article in the UK’s Daily Mail. It includes the same video of Trump and is headlined: “Trump blasts ‘fearmongering’ over new COVID strain and claims ‘left wing lunatics’ are trying to bring back lockdowns and mask mandates to steal the 2024 election.”
We found the same video posted on Trump’s campaign account on X in August 2023.
We did not find any reports from trustworthy news sources of Trump warning about mpox lockdowns.
The video shows Trump talking, falsely, about efforts to bring back Covid lockdowns. He was not warning of impending mpox lockdowns. And the video is from 2023, not 2024 as suggested on social media.
To find out more about the outbreak of mpox in South Africa, read our factsheet here.
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