While discussing a flash poll after CNN's June 27, 2024, presidential debate, did CNN Political Director David Chalian use a name for former first lady Michelle Obama that implied she is a transgender male? No, that's not true: Chalian did not call Michelle Obama "Big Mike." The 31-second-long video clip used to make this claim includes AI-generated fake audio. While the first 15 seconds of the clip's audio are genuine, the second half is fabricated.
The altered clip appeared in a post (archived here) on X on June 28, 2024. The caption for the clip read:
CNN calls Michelle Obama 'Big Mike'
LMAOOOOOOOO
This is how the post appeared at the time of writing:
(Source: X screenshot taken on Fri Jun 28 13:40:13 2024 UTC)
A June 28, 2024, post on X (archived here) contains a 42-second-long clip from CNN's live coverage (embedded below) showing the original footage of the flash-poll discussion without alteration. It begins when CNN Political Director David Chalian, the network's vice president of political coverage, asked, "Who won the debate?"
#BREAKING | Flash poll results: 67% of CNN viewers say Trump won the debate to Biden's 33% pic.twitter.com/ww6U4uqocz
-- VOZ (@Voz_US) June 28, 2024
The first 15 seconds in the altered clip posted on X use the segment's authentic audio. Chalian said:
Who won the debate? We asked debate watchers in our instant poll and the answer is a resounding, 'Donald Trump did.' Sixty-seven percent of debate watchers in our poll say Donald Trump won the debate tonight and Joe Biden ... 33% say he won the debate tonight.
At the 15-second mark of the altered clip, the authentic audio ended, and the AI-generated part began. The fake voice continued:
I mean, guys, at this point I don't give a shit if you bring out Gavin Newsom or maybe Hillary Clinton or even Big Mike ... uhhh, I mean, Michelle Obama. Sorry, I don't know why I said 'Big Mike.' Back to you, Jake.
In the original clip, continuing from the 15-second mark, what Chalian actually said was:
Now this group of debate watchers, they told us who they thought would win the debate going into it before the debate, and take a look at how that changed over time: 55% thought before the debate that Donald Trump would win the debate. Forty-five percent thought Joe Biden would win the debate.
Using Hive Moderation's AI-Generated Content Detection tool, Lead Stories conducted an analysis of the audio in the altered clip. We downloaded a copy of the altered clip and cut it into two segments. The first 15 seconds of the clip scored only a 10.7 percent likelihood of "not likely to be AI-generated" (below left). The second half of the clip (below right) scored 100 percent "likely to be AI-generated."
(Source: Lead Stories composite image showing screenshots from hivemoderation.com results taken on Fri Jun 28 15:24:30 2024 UTC)
Additional Lead Stories fact checks of claims about the 2024 CNN presidential election debate can be found here.
