Trump’s District of America claim, debunked

Rumors have recently begun circulating online after supposed audio of Donald Trump seemed to expose the president sharing a very controversial and downright ridiculous idea. In the clip he can be heard saying that he wants to rename Washington D.C. to the “District of America.”

The audio was shared across multiple social media sites including X, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, X, and Bluesky. It sounds too ridiculous to believe that Trump would suggest something like that, but let’s not forget that this comes only two months after the president had the Gulf of Mexico officially renamed to the Gulf of America.

Is the audio real?

Now it goes without saying, but you can’t trust everything you see (or hear) on the internet, especially nowadays what with A.I. making it hard to trust anything. And it turns out that is exactly what this audio is – it’s an A.I. recreation of Trump’s voice according to a fact-check from Yahoo.com.

While the voice sounds eerily close to Trump’s actual voice, there are a few, slight, variations in the tone and manner of speaking which differ from Trump’s real voice. On top of that, there is also no evidence that he wants to rename the district. 

What did Trump supposedly say?

In the audio Trump mistakenly believes that the District of Columbia (D.C.) part in the capital city’s name was in reference to the South American country, Colombia, prompting him to call for a name change from Washington, D.C. to Washington, D.A.

“No more Washington, D.C. I hate it. It makes no sense. They call it the District of Columbia. It’s got nothing to do with Colombia. It’s nowhere near Colombia. From now on, it will be Washington, D.A., District of America. No more of this Columbia nonsense.”

The name itself actually comes from the feminine name for Columbus, Columbia was the name commonly used for the U.S. back in 1791 when the name for Washington, D.C. was decided. Of course, it wouldn’t be a surprise at all to hear that Trump did not know this and genuinely thought the Columbia part was in reference to the country instead. 

Where did the audio come from?

The origin of the sound was attributed to a TikTok account by the name of @whmole (White House Mole), however, the page no longer exists and the message, “Couldn’t find this account” is all that shows up when looking for it now. It’s unclear whether the owner deleted their account or if it was removed by TikTok, but the page reportedly had a lot of A.I. generated content featuring Trump.

The fact it’s so easy to believe the audio is a testament to just how much credit most people give Trump when it comes to his intelligence. It also demonstrates the danger A.I. poses as a tool for spreading misinformation.