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Disinformation narratives in Spanish about Kamala Harris and how they are being used on the campaign trail

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  • In the midst of the US election campaign, Maldita.es has detected a series of disinformation narratives in Spanish attacking Democratic candidate Kamala Harris
  • ‘She was an escort’, ‘her father is white’ or ‘slept her way to the top’ are some of the widespread narratives
  • Although some of these narratives have been circulating for a long time, they have gone viral during the current campaign. Some of these contents have been shared by personalities such as the singer Janet Jackson or the Republican candidate, Donald Trump

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‘Kamala Harris was an escort,’ ‘she’s a drunk’ or ‘she was a man’ are some of the disinformation narratives that are circulating in Spanish about current US vice-president and Democratic Party candidate for the November presidential elections. Maldita.es has detected narratives attacking the candidate on alleged aspects of her private life and her supposed political ideology. Although some of these disinformation contents have been circulating for a long time, all of them have gone viral in the midst of the election campaign.

Maldita.es has already published about disinformation targeting women in politics, which sometimes differs from that received by their male colleagues. Those contents against women are more focused on attacking their personal or physical appearance than their validity as professionals, according to several experts consulted. They point out as well that this type of disinformation ‘distorts public understanding of women politicians’ careers’ and can discourage them from pursuing a political career. 

These are the disinformation narratives about Kamala Harris that Maldita.es has analysed during the 2024 electoral campaign: 

Clipping from The Stanford Daily, 25 January 1974, showing Donald J. Harris, father of Kamala Harris.

The narrative that states that she is ‘involved in paedophile and prostitution rings’, which is being spread alongside manipulated pictures of Harris with Jeffrey Epstein and rapper Sean ‘Diddy’

That Kamala Harris is allegedly involved in paedophile and prostitution rings is another one of the several disinformation narratives being spread about the vice-president. Images that are not real, that have been manipulated or disseminated with a false context are being used to prove this alleged link.

After the arrest of rapper Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs for sex trafficking and abuse in New York, images of Kamala Harris have been circulating claiming that she appears with Diddy, but this is a hoax

Someother contents claim that Harris had a relationship with Jeffrey Epstein, who is convicted of child sex trafficking. It is disseminated along with two images: an alleged selfie of the Democrat politician with Epstein, and an alleged photograph of the two of them on the beach. However, hoaxes.

The narrative that states that ‘Kamala is a drunk person’: it is spread with a slowed-down video to make it look as if she were under the influence of alcohol

Another narrative circulating is that Kamala Harris is ‘a drunk person’, which has been spread, for example, with a slowed-down video that shows her as if she wereunder the influence of alcohol. In the original video, from a speech in Atlanta (Georgia) on September 20, it can be seen that her normal speed is faster than what it seems in the manipulated version that is being spread.

‘Kamala Harris used to be a man’

It has also been claimed that the Democratic candidate ‘used to be a man’. One of the contents shared with this narrative includes a picture of an alleged man. The messages state that he is Kamal Aroush, that he was born in Benghazi (Libya) and that he was Harris before swapping his gender. This is a hoax. The original image is an official photograph from 2017, when Harris was a Senator representing California, and it has been manipulated to portray her as a man.

‘Kamala has an IQ of 78’

‘Kamala Harris has an IQ [intelligence quotient] of 78 points.’ This is another one of the disinformation narratives that have been circulating about Harris. The source of this narrative is a Reddit post by a user who claims to have attended classes at Howard University with Harris, who allegedly scored 78 points on an IQ test. According to the American Psychiatric Association, ‘a score between 70 and 75 points is a significant intellectual and cognitive limitation’.

But no evidence is provided, and there is no public evidence anywhere to support this claim. Moreover, the user who originally posted it has deleted it, although screenshots of his message continue to circulate on social media. 

“Kamala Harris is paid off by Big Pharma: she is linked to Pfizer”

‘Kamala Harris‘ family has bonds with the pharmaceutical giant Pfizer’. Messages like this  try to link Kamala Harris to the pharmaceutical industry, claiming that she has some kind of bond with Pfizer, company that developed one of the coronavirus vaccines during the pandemic. 

A video with the logos of media outlets CNN and Bellingcat has been used to spread this narrative, but it is a hoax: there is no record of either the international research organisation Bellingcat nor CNN having ever published it. Moreover, the founder of Bellingcat has said that the video is ‘fake,’ and a CNN journalist has added that the material ‘tries to fake the style’ of his recordings.

The video also makes some claims without any proof, source or evidence, about Tony West, Harris’ brother-n-law.

‘Kamala is a criminal who ran over a 13-year-old girl with her car in San Francisco’

According to this disinformation narrative, Alicia Brown, a 26-year-old woman from San Francisco (California, US), alleged that Kamala Harris was involved in a hit-and-run accident in 2011 that left her unable to walk. Further on, the content claims that Harris threatened Brown's family to keep the story quiet. The messages share a video or a link to the story published on a website that allegedly belongs to a local San Francisco TV station.

But there are some evidences that show that it is a disinformation content. The cover photo on the post corresponds to an accident that happened in Guam in 2018. Furthermore, the video with the alleged victim’s testimony shows some features that indicate that it could have been manipulated with tools such as Artificial Intelligence programmes or similar.  

“Kamala Harris is a communist”

The narrative that Kamala Harris ‘is a communist’ has been spread on different occasions and by several people, including former US president and Republican presidential candidate, Donald Trump ever since Harris accepted the Democratic nomination. 

This narrative has also gone viral on social media, and Factchequeado has detected false elements with which it has been spread, such as a fake Soviet Socialist Party credential card with the face of Kamala Harris.

Harris has said, as she did in 2019, that she is not a socialist, but a pro-capitalism person. Moreover, a spokesperson  of her campaign told PolitiFact in August 2024 that the Vice-president was a ‘capitalist’.

Cover image credit: Kamala Harris at a rally in Philadelphia on 10 September, Jim Watson / AFP

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