Does the video show Trump not waving to anyone in front of Trump Tower?

Claim:

A video authentically shows former US President Donald Trump waving to a nonexistent crowd after leaving Trump Tower in New York.

Evaluation:

In the months leading up to the 2024 US election, a rumor circulated online that a video showed former US President Donald Trump “waving to no one” after leaving Trump Tower in New York. A Snopes reader asked us to check if this rumor was true.

The reader’s email included a screenshot of an Instagram post that included a video with the caption, “Speaking of crowds, here’s Donald waving to no one.” The video’s caption read, “The emperor has no clothes.”

Using the screenshot submitted by our reader, we were able to find the same post (archived) shared by a user on Facebook and Instagram on August 11, 2024. As of August 14, this post had nearly 4 million views and was shared more than 34,000 times.

In our research, we concluded that this and other posts falsely claimed that the video showed Trump “waving to no one” or “waving to nonexistent supporters.” The slightly longer original video included loud cheering and a longer shot of a crowd standing behind barriers. In cases like this, where an image or video is real but also contains a false or misleading description, we apply the “False Caption” fact-checking rating.

Find the original post of the video

As seen in the screenshot above, the post submitted by our reader showed the source of the video’s upload as an earlier post (archived) from the Instagram account of the progressive network MeidasTouch. This video, posted to the MeidasTouch account more than two months earlier on June 2, showed the incorrect screen caption “Trump waves to nonexistent supporters.” The incorrect caption also read: “Trump is trying to stage a propaganda video showing lots of supporters cheering him as he leaves Trump Tower, but… no one is there.”

A reverse image search on the TinEye.com website for the first frame of the video returned results for reposts by other users on Imgur.com. Some of these users simply reposted the same video with the caption shared by MeidasTouch.

A watermark visible on some of the videos showed the Instagram name @realtoriabrooke, a user who posted a lengthy video to Instagram and X on May 23, 2024. That user’s X post attributed the video to Margo Martin, whose bio described her as deputy communications director for Trump’s campaign.

In other words, Martin first uploaded the original and longer video on the afternoon of May 23. The video showed the former president leaving Trump Tower to attend a campaign rally in the South Bronx.

Getty Images’ website has several photos showing Martin leaving Trump Tower that day, and some of the images even show her holding the phone that may have been used to record the video.

Trump waved to the people behind the barricades

As circled in the image below, Martin’s video shows people standing behind barricades. Martin’s longer video offered slightly clearer image quality than reposts of the clip, as they went through at least one additional round of video compression.

Upon closer inspection of the original video, we could see crowds of people behind barriers. Additionally, when MeidasTouch uploaded the video, loud cheering was omitted at the end of the original clip. (Image courtesy of Margo Martin/X)

Martin’s original video lasted about four seconds longer than the version uploaded by MeidasTouch. During those four seconds, loud cheering could be heard from the crowd. Police cars and a taxi block the view of other sections of the barricade. Also, quiet cheering can be heard in the distance before the louder cheering.

We’ve reached out to MeidasTouch via email to ask why they shared a shortened version of the clip. We’ve also reached out to Martin via direct message on X to ask her about the day she posted the video. We’ll update this story if we receive a response.

For further reading: We previously reported on a similar rumor that Trump waved to “nobody” at a NASCAR race.

Sources