Trump's Deepfake of Obama Is Meant to Change the Subject

[Zorro]

The president is playing some of MAGA’s favorite songs at just the moment his base seems in danger of splintering.

It is both sad and unsurprising that President Donald Trump posted a deepfake video of former President Barack Obama being arrested in the Oval Office. Battling for position with his MAGA base, which is furious over his inaction on the so-called Epstein files, Trump has resorted to an old tactic: distraction. He has raised another conspiracy theory to change the subject away from a different conspiracy theory.

But in sharing the video, which was created by another user, he is sinking to a new low, even for the president who encouraged crowds to chant “Lock her up!” about his 2016 political opponent and has repeatedly smeared the “Biden crime family.”

But no political rival seems to capture Trump’s imagination like Obama. The apparently AI-generated video depicts FBI agents forcing Obama to the ground as Trump looks on in the Oval Office and the song “YMCA” plays in the background. Later, Obama is portrayed in an orange jumpsuit sitting in a jail cell, a MAGA fantasy made “real.”

For Trump, the video is a return to a theme that helped him break through with the conspiracy-minded Tea Party voters who would become his base. Then, it was birtherism. Now it is fake Obama being fake arrested. The throughline is that Obama, the nation’s first Black president, is somehow illegitimate.

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2025-07-22/deepfake-obama-arrest-video-is-trump-changing-the-subject?accessToken=eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJzb3VyY2UiOiJTdWJzY3JpYmVyR2lmdGVkQXJ0aWNsZSIsImlhdCI6MTc1MzE5NDI0OSwiZXhwIjoxNzUzNzk5MDQ5LCJhcnRpY2xlSWQiOiJTWlNOUTVHUTdMNUkwMCIsImJjb25uZWN0SWQiOiJDNjgyQTUwQzJCRDM0MTFCQTgwQjEwQjZEQjczQzM1MSJ9.vFxKD_RCFqBV25VEzFPBYnX-4Mq9cvRcTwKi3yQb7_4

[PJMcK]

2. Trump's distractions are not working (n/t)