Supposed Craigslist ad for Harris rallygoers was phony (2024)

Vice President Kamala Harris drew more than 15,000 people to her Aug. 9 presidential campaign rally in Arizona — one of her largest campaign crowds yet. But some online are claiming those attendees were paid to be there.

"It’s being reported that every single person at the Kamala rally was paid, carefully vetted and the majority were flown in," a woman says in an Instagram post. "It was invite-only and not open to the public. They’re all paid actors."

An image of a Craigslist ad then appears with the title, "Actors needed (Phoenix Convention Center)." The description of the ad reads, "Actors/help needed for event tomorrow from 2-11 pm. $15 per hour. Duties include protest activity activity and holding signs that are Anti-Trump. Minorities welcome and needed! Looking to fill about 500 spots."

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Featured Fact-check

Kari Lake

stated on July 16, 2024 in in a speech at RNC in Milwaukee

“Just last week, Ruben Gallego voted to let the millions of people who poured into our country illegally cast a ballot in this upcoming election.”

But Harris’ rally, during which she appeared with her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, was not held at the Phoenix Convention Center; it was at the Desert Diamond Arena in Glendale, Arizona, 18 miles from the convention center.

Similar Craigslist ads have been circulating since 2019. In 2020, PolitiFact found that an identical ad was inauthentic.

A Harris-Walz campaign spokespersontold PolitiFact that their "campaign does not pay people to attend rallies, including the recent rally in Arizona,"adding that the event was open to the public and people were able to RSVP until the event reached capacity.

We rate the claim that a Craigslist ad shows "every single person" at Kamala Harris’ Arizona rally was paid False.

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  Instagram posts

  stated on August 11, 2024 in an Instagram post:

  Craigslist ad shows “every single person” at Kamala Harris’ Arizona rally was paid.

  

  

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  Donald Trump

  stated on August 11, 2024 in a post on Truth Social:

  Photo of Kamala Harris’ Aug. 7 rally near Detroit was AI-generated and “there was nobody there.” Attendees pictured “didn’t exist.”

  

  

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  Charlie Kirk

  stated on August 6, 2024 in a Threads post:

  “During Covid, Tim Walz rationed access to monoclonal antibody treatments based on skin color.”

  

  

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  J.D. Vance

  stated on August 7, 2024 in a news conference:

  Says Tim Walz said he carried weapons in war, but “he has not spent a day in a combat zone.”

  

  

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  Lindsey Graham

  stated on August 6, 2024 in una publicación en X:

  El gobernador de Minnesota, Tim Walz, firmó una ley dando educación universitaria gratuita “a los inmigrantes ilegales”.

  

  

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  Donald Trump

  stated on August 8, 2024 in a press conference:

  “I went down in a helicopter with (Willie Brown). We thought maybe this is the end. We were in a helicopter going to a certain location together and there was an emergency landing.”

  

  

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  Viral image

  stated on August 8, 2024 in a Facebook post:

  Says Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz had his stomach pumped “after overingesting horse sem*n.”

  

  

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  Viral image

  stated on August 6, 2024 in a Threads post:

  Photo shows former President Donald Trump “asleep at the 2017 NATO summit.”

  

  

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  Threads posts

  stated on August 2, 2024 in a Threads post:

  “Mike Tyson says he’s willing to box Olympic DUDE with all proceeds to go to a battered women’s charity.”

  

  

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  Donald Trump

  stated on August 8, 2024 in a press conference:

  Says his Jan. 6, 2021, speech on the White House Ellipse drew the “same number of people,” as the 1963 March on Washington where Martin Luther King Jr. gave his “I Have a Dream” speech.