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| - What was claimed
A picture shows French President Emmanuel Macron kissing a man while on holiday.
Our verdict
False. The image is not real. It is a still from an AI-generated video.
A picture shows French President Emmanuel Macron kissing a man while on holiday.
False. The image is not real. It is a still from an AI-generated video.
A photo appearing to show French President Emmanuel Macron kissing a man is a still from an AI-generated video.
The picture has been viewed six million times on X (formerly Twitter) and has also been shared on Facebook. It often appears with the caption: “BREAKING: New photos appear to show French President Emmanuel Macron kissing a man and being fruity as hell.”
Although the picture of the kiss looks pretty convincing, the pause and volume buttons and progress bar visible at the bottom of many versions of the image indicate it comes from a video. Some versions of the claim being shared online also include this video.
The earliest example of this video Full Fact could find was shared on 2 August. The caption, translated from French by Google, reads: “The President's Vacation According to AI... It’s demonic.”
There are other clues the video has been generated by AI, such as the way the bald man’s arm appears to merge with Mr Macron’s before he kisses him, and that his hand appears to stay on Mr Macron’s wrist despite his arm moving away. Mr Macron’s stomach also ripples strangely throughout the clip, as do rocks in the background.
A reverse image search shows several photos posted alongside the kissing picture are real, and were published by the French tabloid Voici. They show Mr Macron spending time with friends on a yacht at the end of July.
One image shows Mr Macron with a man holding his arm, which looks very similar to the kissing image, and may have been used to create the AI-generated video.
Full Fact has previously written about another video of Mr Macron suspected to have been made with AI, as well as other AI-generated images of politicians such as US Vice President, and Democrat presidential candidate Kamala Harris and former US President and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump.
You can read more about how to spot AI-generated videos and images on our website.
This article is part of our work fact checking potentially false pictures, videos and stories on Facebook. You can read more about this—and find out how to report Facebook content—here. For the purposes of that scheme, we’ve rated this claim as false because the picture is not real. It is a still from an AI-generated video.
Full Fact fights for good, reliable information in the media, online, and in politics.
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