Videos show U.S. President Donald Trump announcing 90-day blackout and promoting cryptocurrency tokens.
In early November
In addition to driving fears of the country supposedly having no access to electricity for three months, the clips also allegedly show Trump promoting various cryptocurrency tokens as a strategy to financially benefit during the outage.
For example, on Nov. 6, a user named Shythechosen posted a video on Facebook (archived) and Instagram (archived) featuring the overlaid text, “TRUMP CONFIRMS NO POWER FOR 90 DAYS.” The clip showed the user superimposed over Trump for narration, saying that purchasing the crypto token United States Power Reserve, or USPR, would allow people to make a lot of money during the supposed blackout.
That video began with a clip appearing to show Trump standing in front of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool and saying, “Power in America will be down for 90 days. The only Americans who will have electricity during that time will be those who hold the United States Asset Reserve.”
(@shythechosen via Instagram)
Another Facebook user, Derrick Speaks, posted (archived) the same Trump clip but promoted a different crypto token named United States Asset Reserve, or USAR.
Snopes readers emailed us to ask about this matter, wondering if the power grid would be down across the country and whether they needed to stock up on necessities.
These videos all showed fake clips of Trump. The president never made any such announcement about an upcoming 90-day blackout, nor have any credible sources reported about an upcoming nationwide power outage. Someone used artificial intelligence to alter Trump’s mouth movements and audio to make it appear that he said things he never actually said.
The fake videos and false rumor followed recent news in which the Pentagon reportedly sought to require military bases to be able to operate for at least 90 days without relying on civilian power, fuel, water or supply lines. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth announced the initiative in September, dubbing it “Federal Operations for Resilience, Troop Resources, Energy, Supply, and Survivability,” or FORTRESS. We previously reported that we could not yet independently verify the 90-day requirement part of that story.
Snopes emailed the White House to request comment about the fake videos. We also sent messages to Shythechosen, Speaks and other accounts and will update this article if we receive further information.
Researching the fake videos
Searches found a number of Facebook users whose accounts were dedicated to publishing scripted videos who promoted the fake Trump clips. Those accounts, apparently involved in a coordinated effort, displayed plenty of Facebook reels concentrating on the same kind of content. Examples included Shythechosen, Speaks, Josh Smith, Stefa Jefa and Aug Crypto.
A reverse image search found that the aforementioned Shythechosen clip originated from a genuine moment in which Trump spoke in front of the reflecting pool on Nov. 2. The same moment with Trump looking down to his right, then up and then slightly shaking his head occurs just after the 23:21 mark in this video. Trump was criticizing Democratic candidates prior to the midterm elections, not talking about a 90-day blackout or crypto tokens.
A second video Shythechosen posted featured Trump talking to members of the press outside the White House. That fake clip shows Trump saying, “The power will go down this month. Hospitals will go dark. No heat in January. So I’ll be signing the United States Power Reserve to fix it. You can buy in today and it’ll be over a dollar each on Nov. 30.”
Another reverse image search found the original video from Nov. 7, which, beginning at about the 44-second mark in this clip, shows Trump speaking about Russia, Ukraine and Iran. (Readers can look for the man getting into the car on the left side to match the same moment.)
In a third example, the user Aug Crypto posted (archived) a video with the caption “TRUMP CONFIRMS THE POWER WILL GO DOWN FOR 90 DAYS.” That video showed another AI-generated clip of Trump speaking that matched the clothing and setting from his April interview with CBS News’ “60 Minutes.”
Other videos appearing on the same accounts also showed AI-altered clips of tech entrepreneur Elon Musk (archived), singer-songwriter Taylor Swift (archived) and billionaire Warren Buffett (archived) promoting the same rumor and crypto offer.
In our correspondence with the accounts spreading the fake videos and false rumor, we asked whether someone was paying them to make the videos, if they considered that the clips might drive unnecessary worries of blackouts and requested information regarding the appearance of crypto scam offers. We will update this story if those users provide additional details.
For further reading, we previously investigated whether former President Joe Biden signed an executive order giving China access to or control over the U.S. power grid system, causing the Texas power outage of February 2021.
