Trump shared video of Venezuelans ‘celebrating’ Maduro’s capture. The footage is 17 months old
President Donald Trump shared a video purporting to show throngs of Venezuelans “celebrating” the U.S. military’s recent capture of President Nicolas Maduro — but the footage actually dates from a year and a half ago.
The Republican president posted the video on Monday, two days after the U.S. Army’s Delta Force swooped into Caracas, seized Maduro and his wife and transported them to New York City to stand trial on narco-terrorism charges.
The video, which Trump reposted on Truth Social, shows a massive crowd of people gathered in between buildings and palm trees. Its caption states: “Millions of Venezuelans are celebrating the news of the collapse of the Maduro regime.”
The clip garnered thousands of likes and millions of views, and it was also shared by far-right influencer and InfoWars founder Alex Jones.
However, the footage is actually 17 months old. It was recorded in July 2024 according to Shayan Sardarizadeh, a journalist at BBC Verify, during a protest against Maduro, following the country’s presidential election that month, the outcome of which was widely disputed.
It’s not the first time the 79-year-old president has amplified misleading or outright fabricated videos.
During a May Oval Office meeting, Trump showed South African President Cyril Ramaphosa a clip purportedly showing the graves of hundreds of slain white farmers in the country. He insisted it was “evidence” of mass murder and a supposed genocide against white South Africans.
“Those are burial sites — over a thousand — of white farmers,” Trump said during the sit-down. “And those cars are lined up to pay love on a Sunday morning. Each one of those white things you see is a cross. And there’s approximately a thousand of them. They’re all white farmers.”
But, the video actually showed a tribute to a pair of farmers killed in South Africa in 2020, The Independent previously reported.
In September, the president shared an AI-generated video of Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, in which Schumer stated that Democrats “have no voters anymore, because of our woke, trans bulls***.”
Trump’s surprise seizure of Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, comes after a lengthy pressure campaign against the Maduro regime.
In recent months, the U.S. military launched strikes on over a dozen alleged drug boats near the country, and it has amassed an armada off the coast — the largest assembled in the region in decades. The administration also greenlit CIA operations inside Venezuela and authorized the seizure of oil tankers departing the nation.
Trump has accused Maduro of trafficking drugs into the U.S., a charge that Maduro denies. In response, he’s claimed the U.S. is attempting to fabricate “a new eternal war” and steal Venezuela’ s vast oil reserves. Maduro appeared in court in New York City for the first time on Monday.
Following his capture of the Venezuelan president, Trump said the U.S. will “run” Venezuela for an indeterminate amount of time, adding that American oil companies will “start making money for the country.”
