Did the E.coli outbreak involving McDonald's occur soon after Donald Trump worked at one McDonald's restaurant for one hour during his 2024 presidential campaign? No, that's not true: The E.coli outbreak traced to some McDonald's franchises began weeks before Trump's announcement he would do a shift at a single McDonald's restaurant. The Food and Drug Administration reported that the outbreak started in September while Trump didn't work a shift at a McDonald's until October.
The claim appeared in a post (archived here) on Threads on October 26, 2024. On a poop emoji background, the post said:
He 'worked' 1 hour at a closed McDonald's and now there's an E. Coli outbreak. Everything he touches dies.
This is how the post appeared at the time of writing:
(Source: Threads screenshot taken Wed Oct 30 16:00:00 2024 UTC)
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) reported that illness began appearing as early as September 27, 2024. The report notes the FDA suspects the cause to be a bad batch of onions that affected other chain restaurants as well as some McDonald's locations. Thirteen states had reported cases to the FDA at the time of writing.
Pennsylvania was not one of them. That was where Trump briefly served takeout to people before holding a press conference in Bucks County on October 20, 2024.
Additional Lead Stories fact checks of claims concerning Donald Trump and of claims about the 2024 U.S. presidential election can be read here and here.
