Did a reporter ask President Donald Trump whether he would self-deport, in light of his plan to end birthright citizenship? No, that's not true: A viral video on TikTok fabricated quotes from an unnamed reporter. A clip of Trump saying "Don't ask me questions like that" was actually recorded in 2016, and had to do with his stance on abortion.
The video appeared in a July 6, 2025, post on TikTok (archived here), with an embedded headline of "BREAKING: Reporter Asks if Trump will self deport! See what transpired!" The post garnered more than four million views in three days, and was re-posted on Instagram (archived here) and Facebook (archived here).
It opens with a clip of Trump shouting "Don't ask me questions like that, you're not a very good reporter doing that", before the voiceover narration begins:
Trump lashes out after reporter asks if he'll self-deport, on live television...
Acording to the video, the reporter's question came in the context of a press conference about Trump's intention to end birthright citizenship.
...But things took a sharp turn when a journalist spoke up with a bold question: "Mr. Trump, since you're the child of immigrants and currently facing 34 criminal charges, will you be setting the example and self-deporting?"
The pause was chilling. Trump stood frozen for a few seconds, the burst out in fury: "What a ridiculous question. How dare you." Security rushed to escort the reporter out, but the damage was already done -- cameras had caught every second.
That exchange never took place.
The clip of Trump saying "Don't ask me questions like that" actually came from a press conference in January 2016, in response to being pressed about his past stance on the issue of abortion. That clip, in its proper context, can be watched below:
Furthermore, although the video does not name the reporter who supposedly asked the "self-deport" question, it includes still images of Jim Acosta, who was CNN's White House correspondent during Trump's first administration, and whom that administration barred (archived here) from the White House after a series of tense exchanges with the president.
However, Acosta no longer worked as a White House correspondent (archived here) as of the summer of 2025, so the implication that he was the reporter who "spoke up with a bold question" was also erroneous.
If a reporter had asked Trump "will you be setting the example and self-deporting?", such a question would undoubtedly have formed the basis of widespread news coverage, especially if Trump had replied "What a ridiculous question".
However, a search on Google News (archived here) and Yahoo! News (archived here) for the phrase "will you be setting the example and self-deporting?" yielded no relevant results.
Similarly, despite the TikTok video's claim that "cameras had caught every second" of the tense exchange, we found no relevant entries after searching "Trump reporter self deport" on Google Videos (archived here).
