Photos from Dutch influencers used on X for fake pro-Trump profiles

Someone is using manipulated photos of female influencers to promote Donald Trump’s election campaign on X, CNN and the Center for Information Resilience (CIR) discovered. They identified 56 fake accounts on the former Twitter. Seventeen used photos of European fashion and beauty influencers, including several Dutch women.

The fake accounts praise Trump and his running mate, JD Vance, and discredit the Democratic presidential candidate, Kamala Harris. They also post on divisive topics like LGBTQIA+ rights, support for Ukraine, and conspiracy theories about Covid-19, among other things.

In some cases, the women’s photos were manipulated to make it look like they’re wearing Make America Great Again clothing in support of Trump’s presidential campaign.

Dutch influencer Demi Maric (27) is one of the women. Her photo was used on the now-deleted X account @queen0_gabriela. A pinned post at the top of her timeline said: “If you support Trump, I want to follow you.”

The researchers alerted Demi to the fact that her Instagram photos were being used on a fake pro-Trump profile on X. “I found that quite intense to see,” Demi told RTL Nieuws. “Wespecially because politics doesn’t interest me at all. I’m not at all familiar with it. So it’s also a bit scary to see a profile that uses my photos in that way.”

“Of course, it’s not nice. You see your own photos. You’re profiled as someone you’re not at all. That’s the crazy thing about it,” she told the broadcaster.

Another victim is Debbie Nederlof (32), a German fashion influencer whose photos were used on the account @Luna_2k24. “To be honest, ‘what the fuck,’ was my reaction,” she told CNN. “I have nothing to do with the United States. With Trump, the political things over there. What the hell do I – from a small place in Germany – care about US politics?”

She added: “Every day, my face and my body, my pictures, my identity is stolen, and that makes me very mad. That is definitely not me; definitely, it was never me, and it will never be me.”

Posts on the @queen0_gabriela and @Luna_2k24 accounts matched posts on almost all other fake accounts identified by CNN and CIR. The accounts also often retweeted each other in an attempt to amplify the message.

The researchers found no direct evidence that the Trump campaign was involved in the fake accounts. X refused to provide the data necessary to determine who was behind them. They are reminiscent of the US presidential elections in 2016 when Russian trolls spread disinformation on social media with the aim of influencing the outcome of the election. Trump won that election.

At the time, X, then still Twitter, took measures to prevent the spread of disinformation. But under the leadership of Elon Musk, many of those mechanisms have been dismantled again.