Twitter on Monday labeled a tweet from the Trump campaign's "War Room" account "manipulated media" for posting a misleading clip of Joe Biden saying, "You won't be safe in Joe Biden's America!"
Reality check: More context would have shown that Biden was quoting President Trump and Vice President Pence as saying, "You won't be safe in Joe Biden's America," during a speech in which the Democratic nominee was condemning violent protests and Trump's response to social unrest.
- “Since they have no agenda or vision for a second term, Trump and Pence are running on this, and I find it fascinating. ‘You won’t be safe in Joe Biden’s America.’ And what’s their proof? The violence we’re seeing in Donald Trump’s America,” Biden said.
The big picture: This is not the first time a tweet associated with the president or his campaign has received the label. Twitter has taken a more direct stance in labeling political tweets as misinformation than other social media outlets, such as Facebook, ahead of the 2020 election.
What they're saying:
- The Trump War Room later tweeted, "To all the triggered journalists who can't take a joke about their candidate, it's not our fault Joe Biden was dumb enough to say this on camera."
- Symone Sanders, an adviser to the Biden campaign, responded to the tweet, "The Trump campaign manipulated a video from @JoeBiden’s speech today because they could not challenge the content of the speech. This is their game. They cannot and will not compete on the facts."
The state of play: This is the second tweet of the day associated with the president to receive the label.
- White House deputy chief of staff Dan Scavino tweeted an altered video from a TV interview that made it appear as if Biden was falling asleep. The video was in fact from a 2011 interview with musician Harry Belafonte.
- Belafonte reportedly told The New York Times, "They keep stooping lower and lower. A technical glitch in an interview I did nine years ago now becomes another one of their lies, more of their fake news. I beg every sane American — please vote them out. I knew many who gave their life for the right to vote. Never has it been so vital to exercise that right.”
