No, President-elect Trump didn’t pledge to help Pakistani ex-prime minister Imran Khan retake power

As the world reacted to Donald Trump’s presidential reelection victory, some social media users shared a video purporting to show him promising to help Pakistan’s former prime minister retake power.

“Hello, my Pakistani American friends. I promise, if I win, I will try my best to get Imran Khan out of jail as soon as possible,” Trump appears to say in a Facebook video posted Nov. 6 by multiple users.

“He is my friend. I love him. I will support him to take over the government again and rock and we will work together to make out (sic) ties stronger. Imran Khan Zindabad,” Trump seems to say, using a phrase from Urdu and other languages commonly translated as “long live Imran Khan.”

A TikTok user posted the same video Nov. 3. This post had more than 1 million likes as of Nov. 6.

But there’s no record Trump, the president-elect, ever said those words. These viral videos use old footage with what appears to be fake audio generated by artificial intelligence.

Trump met with Khan repeatedly when both were in power and called him a “good friend” in 2020. But Trump has not called for Khan’s release since he was imprisoned in August 2023 on corruption charges Khan calls politically motivated, Foreign Policy reported Nov. 5.

Apparent errors in the audio are one clue the viral videos are fake. Instead of pledging to “make our ties stronger,” Trump’s voice says “make out ties stronger,” which doesn’t make grammatical sense. (It may have also been a typo for someone typing a script.)

Also, Trump’s lips don’t align with the words spoken in the audio.

Reverse-image searches show the footage comes from a 2017 NBC News interview, India Today reported. In it, Trump wears the same outfit, speaks in front of the same background and moves his lips in sync with the sound of the words he speaks.

This footage first went viral with the fake audio about Khan in March, Newschecker reported.

Social media users have used the same 2017 footage to create other deepfake videos of Trump appearing to say things he never said.

These include a March YouTube video of Trump endorsing a tea company and a July Instagram video of Trump describing an unsubstantiated conspiracy, with overlay text saying “AI trump confessions” and captions including “#AI #Trump #Illuminati #comedy”.

Both deepfake videos had a watermark reading “made with TryParrotAI.com.”

As U.S. officials counted votes the night of Nov. 5, another TikTok user shared a video that dubbed the same audio about Khan over different footage that appeared to show Trump in different clothes speaking directly into the camera. As in the other videos, Trump’s lips don’t line up with the audio.

We rate the claim that viral videos show Trump promised to help Pakistan’s former prime minister get out of prison and retake power Pants on Fire!

By

Gideon Hess

Digital Research Analyst

November 6, 2024

Truth-o-meter Ruling

Pants on Fire!

IF YOUR TIME IS SHORT

• The videos dub audio generated with artificial intelligence over 2017 interview footage.

• President-elect Donald Trump has neither called for Pakistan’s former prime minister Imran Khan’s release nor pledged to return him to power in Pakistan.

Statement

Videos show President-elect Donald Trump promised to help Pakistan’s former prime minister Imran Khan get out of prison and retake power.

Context

social media videos

Speaker/Target

Speaker: Facebook posts

Statement Date

November 6, 2024