Fake Trump statement offering coin investment spreads online

An image circulating online appears to show a Donald Trump statement hawking “Trump Liberty Coins” that can be purchased cheaply and immediately exchanged at a bank for hundreds of times their value. But the supposed screenshot is fake, the former US president’s 2024 campaign told AFP, and no such message appears on his website or Truth Social feed.

“I would like to thank all of my patriots that have shown their support throughout the years, and currently. The best way for me to give back to you is the Trump Liberty Coins project!” the supposed statement says.

“By investing in one Trump Liberty Coin for only $149, you can get $100,000 by exchanging it right away at Bank of America!”

Titled “Statement by Donald J. Trump, 45th President of the United States,” the purported message is dated August 11, 2024 and bears the official campaign logo. It has spread across X and other platforms, such as Facebook.

“So Trump is raising money by selling Trump Liberty Coins for $149 and is telling buyers they can immediately sell it at Bank of America for $100,000,” says Alan Rosenblatt, an adjunct professor at The George Washington University, in an April 11 post. “That really sounds like fraud.”

Screenshot from X taken April 12, 2024

The posts come just weeks after Trump, who has previously marketed branded memorabilia to his supporters, announced he was selling Bibles before Easter.

But the purported statement announcing the sale of “Trump Liberty Coins” is fabricated.

“That is fake,” said Karoline Leavitt, Trump’s national press secretary.

No such statement appears on the Trump campaign’s website or the Republican’s Truth Social feed (archived here and here). Leavitt and other campaign personnel have also not posted anything about “Trump Liberty Coins.”

On April 11, the Trump campaign posted only about presidential debates and the southern US border (archived here and here).

The last time the Trump campaign published a statement titled “Statement by Donald J. Trump, 45th President of the United States” was March 4 (archived here), when he reacted to the Supreme Court striking down a bid to remove him from the state of Colorado’s Republican primary ballot.

Bank of America spokesman Bill Halldin told AFP “there is no connection” between the company and the investment opportunity described in the posts.

Rosenblatt, who appears to have posted the screenshot to X first, told AFP he got it from “an account on Truth Social that did not claim to be from the Trump campaign” and that “deletes all of its past posts and replies.”

He later claimed in a follow-up post that his original message was meant to call out “shady solicitations for giving money to Trump.”

“People here seem to miss the fact that I posted this suggesting that it is fraudulent,” Rosenblatt said in the April 12 post on X (archived here). “I don’t really know who is behind it. But whoever is, as I clearly stated, it is fraud.”

NBC News reported in 2023 that scammers swindled some Trump supporters by similarly advertising “Trump Bucks” that could supposedly be cashed in at banks for profit.

AFP has previously debunked other fake Trump posts here, here, here and here.