Viral Tweets That Were Completely Fake in 2025

Social media in 2025 was absolutely swamped with fakes. AI tools have made it easy for anyone to make fake photos and videos that can fool many people into thinking they’re real. The tech has now advanced sufficiently that you shouldn’t necessarily feel bad if you fall for one that pops up in your feed. OpenAI’s Sora and Google’s Nano Banana Pro are both getting very good.

But you don’t need AI to trick unsuspecting masses of people on sites like Instagram, Threads, Facebook, and X. Sometimes, you can do the same with good, old-fashioned Photoshop techniques. And we saw plenty of that with fake tweets that went viral over the past year.

Did you see that tweet about the botched surgery on Elon Musk’s penis? There were several tweets, actually, but they were all fake. Same with the tweets about President Trump claiming the World Series was rigged and another about far-right influencer Andrew Tate calling any man with a girlfriend “gay.â€

Below we’ve got some of the viral tweets (or Truths, as they’re called on Truth Social) that caught our attention over the past 12 months. And none of them are real.

1) Rob Reiner never tweeted ‘fuck all of you MAGA assholes’

Comedy legend Rob Reiner and his wife, Michele Singer Reiner, were murdered last weekend in their Los Angeles home, prompting an outpouring of grief and tributes to the director’s incredible body of work. But fans of President Donald Trump took the opportunity to spread a tweet that appeared to come from Reiner calling Trump supporters “assholes.†The tweet is fake.

“Until Trump goes to prison I will no longer be posting on Twitter. I’ve had it with the insults and put downs. Fuck all of you MAGA assholes,†the fake tweet reads.

The image, purporting to show a screenshot from 2023, spread far and wide on social media and was often used by Trump fans to attack anyone who was mourning the beloved director. Reiner, a longtime supporter of the Democratic Party, deleted his X account sometime around the 2024 presidential election, but the AFP notes that he addressed the fake tweet in January 2023 after it had gone viral for the first time.

“This is not my account,†Reiner tweeted Jan. 23, 2023, in a post that was archived.

The fake post looks like it was probably modified from an authentic Reiner tweet that read: “Until Trump is Indicted for leading a Deadly Insurrection to Overthrow the United States Government, our Democracy will not be restored.â€

President Trump attacked Reiner in an unhinged screed the day after the director was found dead, calling him “tortured and struggling, but once very talented.†The president even made the killing about himself, claiming with no evidence that Reiner was murdered “due to the anger he caused others†by being anti-Trump.

Trump fans clearly took that as a signal to besmirch Reiner’s memory, and the fake tweet spread widely as a justification to attack the director. Reiner’s 32-year-old son, Nick Reiner, has been arrested and charged with murder.

2) Joe Rogan fell for a fake tweet about the No Kings protests

Joe Rogan is America’s most popular podcaster, averaging about 20 million listeners per week. But Rogan consistently falls for fake images and videos online, even after they’ve been widely debunked. The latest example? Rogan fell for another fake tweet on Wednesday that was supposedly from President Donald Trump.

In an episode from October, Rogan had guests Francis Foster and Konstantin Kisin, both conservative British political commentators, and the three men talked about the No Kings protests that happened Oct. 18. The demonstrations saw millions of people take to the streets in opposition to Trump, and Rogan tried to belittle the efforts, insisting that people were being paid to be there and those who weren’t being paid were just “geriatrics.â€

Rogan also claimed that if the protests were being allowed to happen at all, that must be evidence that Trump couldn’t possibly be a king. And that’s when he promoted the fake tweet he saw—a post made to look like it was from the president on Truth Social.

“No, he didn’t send the troops to stop the protests,†said Rogan. “In fact, he congratulated them on doing a great job, and he said I’m still your president. Tweet’s fucking hilarious. It’s very funny.†One of Rogan’s guests chimed in to say, “yeah, I saw that,†with a laugh.

Rogan told his producer to pull up the tweet, though it seemed clear he was having trouble tracking it down. “Try Truth Social,†Rogan told his producer, who was just off-screen. “You can probably find an image of it since it was posted everywhere.â€

The fake tweet Rogan seemed to be talking about reads, “A HUGE THANK YOU to all the ‘No Kings’ protesters yesterday! I was very concerned a king was trying to take my place, but thanks to your tireless efforts, I am STILL YOUR PRESIDENT! Great job all!!!†But there’s nothing about it that’s real.

The producer never did seem to find the post, probably because he didn’t want to tell Rogan it was fake. It wasn’t even a recent fake tweet. It first started circulating around the first No Kings Day on June 14. The screenshot went viral back in June on platforms like X and Instagram. As the Daily Beast notes, the president’s son, Donald Trump Jr., shared the fake tweet but acknowledged it was fake. Fox Business host Maria Bartiromo shared the fake post in June as well, though she didn’t know it wasn’t real.

Rogan droned on and on about the protests during his show and claimed they were identical to what happened with Kamala Harris’s 2024 presidential campaign. The podcast host insisted that the Harris campaign “filled up stadiums†with people who were paid to be there, a claim with no basis in fact. Rogan said that it “became a job†for the people at Harris rallies and that “should not be legal†because it’s “deception.â€

Incredibly, Trump’s actual commentary on the No Kings protests is somehow more aggressive than the fake version Rogan highlighted on Wednesday. In reality, Trump shared an AI video on Truth Social showing himself flying a fighter jet and dumping literal shit on protesters.

Rogan is not a particularly bright man. But, again, he has an enormous audience in the millions. And he’s always falling for fake shit, whether it’s AI videos of Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz or tweets about “Jewish tunnels,†sourced to fake accounts with characters like Dick Stroker.

3) Charlie Kirk never tweeted about scratching his anus

There was a tweet that went viral back in July, before Charlie Kirk’s killing in September, that appeared to show the MAGA influencer criticizing New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani for eating with his hands.

“I have so many thoughts on this that it literally keeps me up at night, Zohran Mamdani eating rice with his HANDS during an interview,†the tweet read. “I very sincerely doubt he has to scratch his anus any less than the rest of us which makes that whole display unbelievably disgusting.â€

The image appeared on sites like Reddit, X, and Bluesky, and it seemed plausible enough. Right-winger users on X hurled racist comments at Mamdani about it. Even elected Republicans got in on the act, with Rep. Brandon Gill, a Republican from Texas, writing, “Civilized people in America don’t eat like this. If you refuse to adopt Western customs, go back to the Third World.â€

The tweet that looked like it was from Kirk was believable, though it seemed like it was accidentally admitting that Kirk really dug in to scratch his anus. But this one was fake.

Kirk’s real commentary on the issue mostly centered around the idea that Mamdani didn’t actually want to eat rice with his hands. The late commentator suggested it was actually all for show: “It’s a calculated stunt, just like him constantly changing his accent. Honestly, that’s a lot worse and more disturbing than if he just authentically ate that way. One is backwards. The other shows his contempt for our culture.â€

Another tweet in the same style also spread, appearing to show Kirk doubling down on the idea that he frequently is digging into his asshole: “To all the people making fun of me for scratching my itchy asshole… keep coping! This is something that happens to everybody and that’s why it’s disgusting to eat with your hands like Zohran Mamdani.â€

The image was made to look like it had been deleted, even though X doesn’t show that notice for recently deleted tweet anymore. That tweet was also fake.

Mamdani has since won his election and will be sworn in as the mayor of New York next month.

4) Elon Musk didn’t tweet about his ‘botched penis’

Back in April, all anyone could talk about was President Donald Trump’s tariffs. The president had dubbed April 2 “Liberation Day,†and he announced a wide swath of tariffs on every country across the globe.

The next day, a tweet that appeared to have been sent by Elon Musk started spreading on social media. The tweet read, “I want a 90% tariff on Canada because Grimes told everyone about my botched penis.†Grimes is the mother of two of Musk’s many children, and she was born in Canada.

However, the tweet is fake.

The tweet appears to have been created by an account on X called @marionumber4, which also has the name 679 Enthusiast. The pseudonymous account has a long history of creating fake “deleted†tweets of right-wing figures like Musk, Candace Owens, and Grimes. And this one is no different.

That same creator made several fake “botched penis†tweets about Elon Musk in 2025, including one made to look like it came from Ashley St. Clair but had been deleted. St. Clair has a child whom she says was fathered by Musk.

The fake tweet that appears to have been from St. Clair reads “the fucked up botched penis is real.â€

By putting the words “this post was deleted†at the bottom of the fake tweet, it signals to the reader that any attempt to find the tweet on the person’s timeline is going to be a futile effort. And that appears to be part of the appeal for hoaxsters who create these kinds of fake viral tweets, as we saw with the Charlie Kirk tweet. But accounts like @marionumber4 have been doing this for so long, it’s easy to check with the usual photoshopping suspects whenever one of these is circulating online. The person behind that account has previously confirmed to Gizmodo that they make these fake tweets.

As the fake tweet gets shared outside of the original creator’s circles, it circulates with people wondering if it’s real. And X users now have the ability to ask Grok about the veracity of various tweets like a real-time AI fact-checker. That’s what people did in the replies to various tweets about the supposed botched penis surgery. One user asked Grok, “Is this real,†and they got an interesting reply.

“Ashley St. Clair likely broke an NDA by posting about Elon Musk’s ‘botched penis,’ given their relationship and typical NDA use,†Grok responded. “She may face financial fallout, as seen in custody and support disputes, but the claim of a specific penalty for penis comparisons is likely exaggerated, not standard in NDAs.â€

The reference to an NDA appears to have been a joke by the X account UAE Exotic Falconry and Finance. But Grok’s fixation on some kind of non-disclosure agreement looks like a product of the leading question rather than something that actually exists. Neither Musk nor St. Clair appears to have discussed an NDA about their relationship, and it’s not publicly known if one actually exists.

That ambiguity speaks to one of the major flaws in technology with generative AI. If you feed it enough garbage, you’re just going to get garbage back. And X is nothing if not a flaming garbage dump in 2025. Musk bought the platform in late 2022 and did everything he could to scare off normal people with his far-right ideology. Fringe figures who had previously been banned on Twitter, like white supremacist Nick Fuentes and conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, were welcomed back with open arms. And that’s made X a mess of misinformation and extremist activity.

5) The fake Epstein tweet that went viral before the identical real ones

There were some rather unbelievable developments in the news about Jeffrey Epstein in 2025. We finally saw some surveillance camera footage from the jail where Epstein died, even if it all seemed extremely irregular. And a small group of elected politicians came together to force a vote on getting government files about Epstein released. Those are due out Dec. 16, though it remains to be seen how many redactions the Department of Justice might make.

President Donald Trump has been at the center of the controversy, considering the fact that he was president when Epstein died in a federal jail, and many people don’t believe Epstein actually killed himself. Trump was reportedly best friends with Epstein for at least 15 years, and the Wall Street Journal even obtained a letter that Trump wrote to Epstein for his birthday, which included a drawing of a naked female figure.

Trump has been incredibly defensive about the release of the Epstein files. But that defensiveness has made the topic a frequent subject for people joking on the internet. Like in the case of this tweet, which was widespread on Instagram, X, and Facebook over the summer. But it’s not real.

The funny thing about this fake tweet is that it’s extremely close to things Trump would actually write on social media about the case. This fake tweet went viral on July 12, and less than a week later, he wrote on Truth Social: “Their new SCAM is what we will forever call the Jeffrey Epstein Hoax, and my PAST supporters have bought into this ‘bullshit,’ hook, line, and sinker.’â€

Trump has repeatedly called the Epstein story a hoax, and he was reportedly pressuring elected politicians not to vote for releasing the Epstein files, even calling them directly. Marjorie Taylor Greene, one of Trump’s most loyal supporters, even had a falling out with the president over the issue, and she’s retiring early because he turned his back on her.

Sometimes fake tweets go viral before they capture a sentiment that already exists. Trump never tweeted “STOP TALKING ABOUT EPSTEIN!!!!†but he may as well have.

6) Andrew Tate didn’t say a man with a girlfriend was “gayâ€

Andrew Tate, the far-right manosphere influencer, regularly tweets the most bizarre bullshit around. But if you saw a tweet that having a girlfriend in 2025 made you gay, that one was fake.

The fake tweet was picked up by outlets like Pink News and Australia’s Star Observer, but there’s no evidence it was real. Gizmodo checked Tate’s X feed shortly after the tweet started to go viral on social media, and it wasn’t there.

Oddly enough, the sentiment of this fake tweet is actually something Tate has posted many times. Back in July, Tate tweeted, “I don’t want a relationship, I don’t wanna talk girl shit, I don’t wanna put up with her moods, I’m not gay.â€

Much like viral fakes featuring Trump, the real thing is often just as absurd.

7) Ian Miles Cheong didn’t tweet ‘get out of my country’ to Mamdani

Ian Miles Cheong is one of those Elon Musk fans that you’ll come across frequently if you spend time on X. Cheong, who’s originally from Malaysia but lives in Dubai, has built a name for himself whining about wokeness and pushing a right-wing worldview long before Twitter became X.

But Cheong’s prominence and generally annoying presence have made him the target of photoshoppers. And even though Cheong has previously interjected into U.S. political debate like he actually lives in the country, one tweet in particular got a lot of pick-up this year.

“I refuse to be governed by a Ugandan named Zohran Kwame Mamdani. Get out of my country,†the fake tweet reads.

The post, as you’ll notice, features the “this post has been deleted†text at the bottom. But it’s another one created by pranksters, made to look like it was deleted.

Cheong often writes about U.S. politics. But he’s never claimed to actually be an American.

8) Trump didn’t tweet about the World Series being rigged

Back in October, a tweet that appeared to come from President Donald Trump said he’d refuse to invite whoever wins the World Series to the White House. The post said it was because he believed the game was rigged, either by the mafia or the Democrats. But the tweet isn’t real.

The post was made to look like it was coming from President Trump’s official Truth Social account, the platform he owns and the first place where he posts all his most unhinged messages.

“NO MATTER WHO WINS I WILL REFUSE TO INVITE EITHER BASEBALL TEAM TO MY BALL ROOM AS THEY ARE BOTH RUN BY HIGHLY INEPT OFFICIALS FROM CALIFORNIA AND ONTARIO CANADA,†the fake tweet reads.

“I DON’T HOST LOSERS. WE ARE ACTIVELY INVESTIGATING MLB. THIS WORLD SERIES IS RIGGED, PROBABLY BY THE DEMS & THE MAFIA,†the fake tweet continues.

The screenshot spread far and wide, showing up on Threads, X, Bluesky, Instagram, and Facebook. But Trump never wrote this one.

The reaction to the viral post was about what you’d expect, especially among fans of the Toronto Blue Jays. Many Canadians made fun of the fake Trump tweet, since they didn’t think a Canadian team would even be invited to the White House in the first place.

There were many red flags in the fake post from Trump, but the reference to the ballroom might be one of the most glaring. The president demolished the East Wing of the White House, and he’s building a ballroom with “donations†from private companies and individuals who have given him millions. But even on the most ambitious timeline, the ballroom won’t be completed by the time a White House visit by the 2025 World Series champions might take place.

Trump hasn’t announced a completion date for his ridiculous monstrosity, but the administration has said it will be done before his second term is up in Jan. 2029.

9) Trump didn’t call the Toronto Blue Jays un-American

Another fake post that was popping up here and there on social media specifically called out the Blue Jays.

“WE WILL BE INVESTIGATING THE UN AMERICAN BLUE JAYS WHO ARE ATTEMPTING TO STEAL OUR BELOVED WORLD SERIES,†the fake tweet reads. “THEY WILL DEFINITELY NOT BE INVITED TO THE WHITE HOUSE.â€

At the end of the day, all of these fake tweets go viral because it’s impossible to tell which screeds from President Trump are authentic. Trump has always been off his rocker, but he’s gotten increasingly weird during his second term, posting some of the oddest things that a president has ever expressed in public.

As just one example, Trump posted an AI video of himself last month talking about “medbeds,†a bizarre conspiracy theory that claims there are real beds being hidden from the public that can heal all diseases. The video even includes a fake Trump touting these miracle cures and insisting they were going to be available soon to “restore every citizen to full health.â€

In a world where the president is posting about medbeds—to say nothing of the Department of Homeland Security posting Nazi propaganda—it can be extremely difficult to tell what’s real. And that’s not going to change as long as the Trump regime remains in power. In fact, it’s likely to get much, much worse.

10) Trump didn’t announce 15-year car loans

An announcement from the White House went viral this year, claiming that President Donald Trump is working on making 15-year car loans available to all Americans. The announcement is fake. But it’s a joke based on something very real.

“As he continues to work hard to make the American Dream accessible to everyone, President Trump today has asked the Departments of Transportation and Commerce to make vehicle ownership for all a reality by introducing 15 year car loans! Secretaries Duffy and Lutnick are already working on it!
Delivering for America!†the viral screenshot reads.

While the announcement has been circulating widely on platforms like TikTok, Instagram, Bluesky, and TikTok, it’s not real.

Where did this announcement actually come from? It appears to have originated with a satire account on X called TheRealThelmaJohnson. The tweet included a joke, along with the photoshopped announcement, that reads: “If you want to pay 100 grand for a 2009 Chevy Equinox this is the way…â€

If you want to pay 100 grand for a 2009 Chevy Equinox this is the way… pic.twitter.com/ZfQBKgJs8e

— TheRealThelmaJohnson (@TheRealThelmaJ1) November 9, 2025

And that joke gets close to what’s funny about a 15-year car loan. The longer the car loan, the more the borrower is ultimately paying for the car, thanks to interest payments. The original tweet from “Thelma Johnson†only has about 150,000 views, a very humble number for something that’s gone “viral.†That’s because it has been widely shared on other platforms (including X, though without attribution to the original creator) and people think it’s real.

The reason many people think it’s real is that President Trump actually proposed something just as ridiculous as a 15-year car loan recently. On Nov. 8, Trump posted a graphic to Truth Social comparing himself to President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who helped popularize the 30-year mortgage during the 1930s. The graphic shows a photo of Trump with the words “50-year mortgage†underneath without further explanation.

Politico reports that the graphic actually came from a man named Bill Pulte, the director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency. Pulte reportedly visited Trump at Mar-a-Lago with a 3×5 posterboard in hand. Roughly 10 minutes later, the graphic was posted to Trump’s Truth Social account, according to Politico. That apparently angered Trump’s aides, with Politico characterizing it as “bad politics and bad policy.â€

The idea of the 30-year mortgage was that it allowed people to live in and “own†their homes, even if it took a significant portion of someone’s life to pay it off. At the end of the mortgage, the person would at least have ownership of a property, even if they paid much more than it was worth in the end. The idea of the 50-year mortgage takes this to the extreme, especially with the median age of first-time home buyers in the U.S. currently at 40. And the only people who would be taking out 50-year mortgages would be the people in the most precarious financial positions, which means they’d be most likely to default. Even if a borrower made good on their loan agreement, the prospect of them ever actually owning the property would be slim.

Trump was asked by Laura Ingraham on Fox News about the proposal, and he didn’t back down from the idea. “All it means is you pay less per month,†Trump said. “Pay it over a longer period of time. It’s not like a big factor. It might help a little bit.â€

And all of this ridiculousness brings us to the idea of the 15-year car loan. It’s a joke, but plenty of high-profile X accounts seemed to think it was real, including Unusual Whales and Polymarket. When one account racked up 1 million views and faced skepticism from other users, she linked to a tweet from AF Post that she suggested was some proof the White House was considering it.

In reality, AF Post (America First Post) isn’t a real, credible news outlet. It’s affiliated with white supremacist Nick Fuentes, and it posts fake garbage all the time. But AF Post has a blue checkmark, which anyone can buy for $8 from Elon Musk, and some people are under the illusion that it still carries some weight of “verification.â€

The “Thelma Johnson†account often shares fake White House announcements, so the next time you see something like that, which sounds too good to be true, maybe check that specific account to see if they were the first one to post it. That’s what we do here at Gizmodo whenever we see a ridiculous tweet that reads “this post has been deleted.†There’s one particular prankster who likes to do that one, and we always check their account when something similar goes viral.