ziggy
Verified User
WashingtonCNN —
A social media account run by Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign has been repeatedly deceptive.
The @KamalaHQ account, which has more than 1.3 million followers on the X social media platform formerly known as Twitter, has made a habit of misleadingly clipping and inaccurately captioning video clips to attack former President Donald Trump.
The Harris campaign deploys @KamalaHQ as a kind of irreverent attack dog, using jocular posts to draw attention to controversial, incorrect, or dubious comments by Trump and his allies. But the account, which the Harris campaign calls its “official rapid response page,” has itself made inaccurate comments on multiple occasions.
Below are eight examples of false or misleading video posts from the account since mid-August, including three from the latter part of this week. All of them have previously been highlighted by an anonymous rebuttal account called @KamalaHQLies, which itself has more than 268,000 followers.
Misleadingly describing a Trump comment about his supporters
An August 17 post from @KamalaHQ strongly suggested Trump had gotten confused about what state he was in during an event in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. The post said, “Trump: Would that be okay, North Carolina? (He is in Pennsylvania).” It included a six-second video clip in which Trump said, while pointing to his left, “Would that be okay, North Carolina? I don’t think so, right.”
The Harris campaign was explicit about its intentions in the version of the post it made on the Instagram @KamalaHQ account, saying, “Donald Trump is lost and confused.”
But Trump was not lost or confused.
The full video of the rally shows that earlier in the speech, Trump had pointed to the same spot on his left to acknowledge and then speak to a group of ardent supporters from North Carolina, eventually saying, “Thank you very much. North Carolina!” Later, in the moment shown by @KamalaHQ, he pointed to these supporters again and referred to them as “North Carolina.” He had not forgotten he was speaking in Pennsylvania.
The Harris campaign declined to comment on this @KamalaHQ post.
Deceptively clipping and misleadingly describing a Trump comment about immigration
On Thursday, the @KamalaHQ account made a new attempt to suggest that Trump was confused about his location. Its post said, “Trump: ‘Pennsylvania, remember this when you have to go to vote’ (He is in Arizona).” It included an eight-second clip of Trump saying in a Tucson speech, “So Pennsylvania, remember this when you have to go to vote, okay, just remember this: 2,000% increase. This is a small —…”
The Instagram post of this remark, too, was more explicit than the X post; on Instagram, the Harris campaign added text over top the video that read, “Trump forgets which state he is in (again).”
But Trump, again, had not forgotten which state he was in.
The extended footage shows that the Harris campaign clipped out critical context: Trump was talking about immigration, a key topic in Arizona, and had just read a part of his prepared text about how a small Pennsylvania town has “experienced a 2,000% increase in the population of Haitian migrants under Kamala Harris.” He then added, “So Pennsylvania, remember this when you have to go to vote, okay, just remember this: 2,000% increase, this is a small town; of all a sudden they got thousands of people.”
One could try to argue it’s odd for Trump to make a direct appeal to Pennsylvanians while speaking in Arizona. But Trump’s remarks anywhere in the country are broadcast to voters everywhere in the country, and, regardless, @KamalaHQ eliminated the context that would allow people to develop an informed opinion on this remark.
The Harris campaign declined to comment on this @KamalaHQ post.
Deceptively clipping and misleadingly describing a Trump comment about his 2017 Charlottesville remark
A Friday post from @KamalaHQ said, “Trump says ‘nothing was done wrong’ in Charlottesville in 2017 when neo-Nazis chanted ‘Jews will not replace us’ and killed an innocent woman.” The post included a 10-second clip of Trump telling reporters at a Friday event in California, “…like on Project 2025, I have no idea about — had nothing to do with me, he didn’t correct her, he knew that. Charlottesville — nothing was done wrong.”
But the full video of Trump’s California comments shows that the Harris campaign deceptively cut the clip right before Trump made clear he was not claiming that neo-Nazis in Charlottesville did nothing wrong or that the murder of innocent Charlottesville counterprotester Heather Heyer was not wrong.
Rather, the full video shows, he was arguing that he did nothing wrong with his “very fine people, on both sides” comment in 2017 about the events in Charlottesville, which he has repeatedly insisted was not about white nationalists.
Specifically, Trump was complaining that a moderator of the presidential debate on Tuesday, David Muir of ABC News, did not challenge how Harris described Trump’s 2017 comments. We say Harris’ debate description of the 2017 comments was fair, but regardless, Trump was not defending murder on Friday.
Here is Trump’s full Friday remark, in which he invoked various Fox News hosts: “I think he (Muir) corrected me 11 times. Of the 11 times, I don’t think he had the right to correct me at all. Didn’t correct her once. Like on Project 2025, I have no idea about — had nothing to do with me, he didn’t correct her, he knew that. Charlottesville — nothing was done wrong. All you had to do is read my statement one more sentence and you would’ve seen that. Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, Jesse (Watters), all of them, they — Greg Gutfeld — they all took that and they corrected it many times. But they keep coming with the same lies.”
Defending the @KamalaHQ post, the Harris campaign said in an email: “He’s saying he did ‘nothing wrong’ in relation to him saying ‘very fine people’ who did what is described in the tweet.”
There are two problems with this. The post itself did not acknowledge that Trump’s “nothing wrong” comment was about his own previous remark. And while there’s a solid case that this 2017 “very fine people” comment was about some white nationalists, there’s no basis for claiming it was about Heyer’s murderer in particular — much less that Trump’s “nothing wrong” comment on Friday was about this murderer.
A social media account run by Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign has been repeatedly deceptive.
The @KamalaHQ account, which has more than 1.3 million followers on the X social media platform formerly known as Twitter, has made a habit of misleadingly clipping and inaccurately captioning video clips to attack former President Donald Trump.
The Harris campaign deploys @KamalaHQ as a kind of irreverent attack dog, using jocular posts to draw attention to controversial, incorrect, or dubious comments by Trump and his allies. But the account, which the Harris campaign calls its “official rapid response page,” has itself made inaccurate comments on multiple occasions.
Below are eight examples of false or misleading video posts from the account since mid-August, including three from the latter part of this week. All of them have previously been highlighted by an anonymous rebuttal account called @KamalaHQLies, which itself has more than 268,000 followers.
Misleadingly describing a Trump comment about his supporters
An August 17 post from @KamalaHQ strongly suggested Trump had gotten confused about what state he was in during an event in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. The post said, “Trump: Would that be okay, North Carolina? (He is in Pennsylvania).” It included a six-second video clip in which Trump said, while pointing to his left, “Would that be okay, North Carolina? I don’t think so, right.”
The Harris campaign was explicit about its intentions in the version of the post it made on the Instagram @KamalaHQ account, saying, “Donald Trump is lost and confused.”
But Trump was not lost or confused.
The full video of the rally shows that earlier in the speech, Trump had pointed to the same spot on his left to acknowledge and then speak to a group of ardent supporters from North Carolina, eventually saying, “Thank you very much. North Carolina!” Later, in the moment shown by @KamalaHQ, he pointed to these supporters again and referred to them as “North Carolina.” He had not forgotten he was speaking in Pennsylvania.
The Harris campaign declined to comment on this @KamalaHQ post.
Deceptively clipping and misleadingly describing a Trump comment about immigration
On Thursday, the @KamalaHQ account made a new attempt to suggest that Trump was confused about his location. Its post said, “Trump: ‘Pennsylvania, remember this when you have to go to vote’ (He is in Arizona).” It included an eight-second clip of Trump saying in a Tucson speech, “So Pennsylvania, remember this when you have to go to vote, okay, just remember this: 2,000% increase. This is a small —…”
The Instagram post of this remark, too, was more explicit than the X post; on Instagram, the Harris campaign added text over top the video that read, “Trump forgets which state he is in (again).”
But Trump, again, had not forgotten which state he was in.
The extended footage shows that the Harris campaign clipped out critical context: Trump was talking about immigration, a key topic in Arizona, and had just read a part of his prepared text about how a small Pennsylvania town has “experienced a 2,000% increase in the population of Haitian migrants under Kamala Harris.” He then added, “So Pennsylvania, remember this when you have to go to vote, okay, just remember this: 2,000% increase, this is a small town; of all a sudden they got thousands of people.”
One could try to argue it’s odd for Trump to make a direct appeal to Pennsylvanians while speaking in Arizona. But Trump’s remarks anywhere in the country are broadcast to voters everywhere in the country, and, regardless, @KamalaHQ eliminated the context that would allow people to develop an informed opinion on this remark.
The Harris campaign declined to comment on this @KamalaHQ post.
Deceptively clipping and misleadingly describing a Trump comment about his 2017 Charlottesville remark
A Friday post from @KamalaHQ said, “Trump says ‘nothing was done wrong’ in Charlottesville in 2017 when neo-Nazis chanted ‘Jews will not replace us’ and killed an innocent woman.” The post included a 10-second clip of Trump telling reporters at a Friday event in California, “…like on Project 2025, I have no idea about — had nothing to do with me, he didn’t correct her, he knew that. Charlottesville — nothing was done wrong.”
But the full video of Trump’s California comments shows that the Harris campaign deceptively cut the clip right before Trump made clear he was not claiming that neo-Nazis in Charlottesville did nothing wrong or that the murder of innocent Charlottesville counterprotester Heather Heyer was not wrong.
Rather, the full video shows, he was arguing that he did nothing wrong with his “very fine people, on both sides” comment in 2017 about the events in Charlottesville, which he has repeatedly insisted was not about white nationalists.
Specifically, Trump was complaining that a moderator of the presidential debate on Tuesday, David Muir of ABC News, did not challenge how Harris described Trump’s 2017 comments. We say Harris’ debate description of the 2017 comments was fair, but regardless, Trump was not defending murder on Friday.
Here is Trump’s full Friday remark, in which he invoked various Fox News hosts: “I think he (Muir) corrected me 11 times. Of the 11 times, I don’t think he had the right to correct me at all. Didn’t correct her once. Like on Project 2025, I have no idea about — had nothing to do with me, he didn’t correct her, he knew that. Charlottesville — nothing was done wrong. All you had to do is read my statement one more sentence and you would’ve seen that. Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, Jesse (Watters), all of them, they — Greg Gutfeld — they all took that and they corrected it many times. But they keep coming with the same lies.”
Defending the @KamalaHQ post, the Harris campaign said in an email: “He’s saying he did ‘nothing wrong’ in relation to him saying ‘very fine people’ who did what is described in the tweet.”
There are two problems with this. The post itself did not acknowledge that Trump’s “nothing wrong” comment was about his own previous remark. And while there’s a solid case that this 2017 “very fine people” comment was about some white nationalists, there’s no basis for claiming it was about Heyer’s murderer in particular — much less that Trump’s “nothing wrong” comment on Friday was about this murderer.