Venezuelans Kneeling in Tears for Trump? Fake AI Video Explodes on X – 'Total Deepfake Hoax,' Experts Warn

As news broke that US forces had captured Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro and flown him out of the country, a puzzling video began racing across social media. It showed crowds of Venezuelans kneeling in the streets, crying, waving flags, and thanking US President Donald Trump for what captions described as their 'liberation.'

Within hours, the clip had millions of views. By the next day, fact-checkers and digital forensics experts were calling it something else entirely: a deepfake.

The Video That Lit Up X

According to fact checkers, the video first appeared on TikTok from an account known for publishing AI-generated content, before spreading rapidly to X, Instagram, and Facebook.

Several versions circulated, some with English subtitles added, showing people chanting 'Thank you, Donald Trump' and 'The hero,' while others depicted crowds kneeling or holding signs praising the US president.

One of the most widely shared posts came from the X account Wall Street Apes, which claimed the footage showed Venezuelans 'crying on their knees' after Maduro's arrest. High-profile reposts followed, pushing the clip into millions of timelines just hours after the real US military operation on 3 January.

Experts Flag Clear AI Errors

Almost as quickly, researchers began dismantling the video's claims. BBC Verify journalist Shayan Sardarizadeh stated that all four clips circulating were AI-generated, pointing to obvious visual errors. Among them were incorrect Venezuelan flags, mismatched license plates, objects that appeared and vanished mid-frame, and unnatural crowd movements that did not match real-world physics.

X's Community Notes were added to multiple viral posts, warning users that the footage was fabricated. Many media outlets described the clips as 'transparently fake' and part of a broader flood of AI-generated misinformation following the Maduro operation.

Several users openly questioned why the videos remained online, calling them 'AI slop' and accusing prominent accounts of knowingly spreading false imagery.

Why the Timing Made It Believable

The fake videos spread against the backdrop of a real and dramatic escalation. On 3 January, the US confirmed a large-scale military strike inside Venezuela that resulted in Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, being captured and flown out of the country.

US officials said both had been indicted in New York on charges tied to narco-terrorism conspiracies.

That operation followed months of escalating US military action in the region, including repeated strikes on vessels accused of drug smuggling, a naval buildup in the Caribbean, and the designation of multiple Latin American criminal groups as foreign terrorist organisations.

With emotions already running high and information moving fast, the AI videos found an audience primed to believe dramatic visuals even without verification.

Inside Venezuela, however, reporting painted a far more restrained picture. 'There is fear and ⁠uncertainty,' a Venezuelan citizen told CNN, describing quiet streets and concern over what would come next.

No credible reporting confirmed mass public displays of gratitude toward Trump within Venezuela itself.

Meanwhile, the viral fake video has become a textbook example of how generative AI can be used to manufacture political narratives during breaking news. Demands to delete the clip persist in the thread, but the video, with more than 39k retweets and 5 million views, continues to exist on X.