Did Donald Trump say "144,000 Black people with superpower godlike abilities" are the "chosen ones", as is reported in a TikTok video? No, that's not true: In a viral clip on social media, the original sound from an NBC interview was replaced by AI-generated audio. The counterfeit video uses footage from a 2017 interview in which Trump talked about firing FBI Director James Comey.
The story appeared in a post (archived here) on TikTok where it was published on March 22, 2024, under the title:
TRUMP SPOKE HEBREW
144000 CHOSEN PEOPLE
OLD TESTAMENT 👽 🌌
The caption continued:
#duet with @Nreallife901 #israelites spoke out America blacks and Mexican how they stole are lane 1776 from 400 years ago
This is what the post looked like on TikTok at the time of writing:
(Source: TikTok screenshot taken on Mon Apr 1 13:35:22 2024 UTC)
In the video, counterfeit audio makes it sound like Trump was recorded saying the following:
They know that this is god-chosen people and this is their land. And 144,000 has already been awakened, regaining the memories and soon to have their powers. But this solar flash hit that cabal won't know what to do with. These are the first fruits the 144,000 is sealed and awake. I don't think the cabal understand what this means. The chosen ones are already awoke in gaining all of their memories. This means they know what's coming. Just picture this: 144,000 Black people with superpower godlike abilities. Me and Putin try to warn them -- we're dealing with something we don't quite understand, they are ancient gods primordial...
Trump's lips are out of sync with the sound in this clip on TikTok.
Lead Stories submitted the clip for technical analysis. Four out of five evaluation models utilized by DeepFake-O-Meter (archived here), a tool (archived here) maintained by the University of Buffalo, indicated the presence of AI-generated sound, and three out of five models showed an extremely high likelihood that the audio track from the video on TikTok was a deepfake:
(Source: DeepFake-O-Meter screenshot taken on Mon Apr 1 14:03:08 2024 UTC)
A reverse image search shows that the post on TikTok reused the video track from a 2017 NBC interview (archived here) recorded when Trump was president.
The composite image below shows that in both videos, Trump is wearing the same outfit in the same setting filmed from the same angle:
(Sources: TikTok screenshot taken on Mon Apr 1 14:53:49 2024 UTC; YouTube screenshot taken on Mon Apr 1 Screen 15:01:38 2024 UTC; composite image by Lead Stories)
Furthermore, at the 12:37 mark in the NBC interview, which was posted on YouTube on May 11, 2017, Trump's facial expression matches what is seen in the TikTok post.
The counterfeit Trump voice's citation of a specific number -- 144,000 people -- is an apparent reference to the appearance of that number in the biblical Book of Revelation (archived here).
Contrary to the claim, Trump did not mention that number in the conversation with NBC host Lester Holt.
Instead, Trump discussed the Russia probe and his decision to remove then-FBI Director James Comey from office.
A search for the key phrases "Donald Trump" and "144,000 Black people with superpower godlike abilities" (archived here) across websites indexed by Google News did not show that any credible sources ever reported Trump saying those words:
(Source: Google News screenshot taken on Mon Apr 1 15:24:18 2024 UTC)
Other Lead Stories fact checks about politics can be found here; stories about deepfakes are here.
