As Donald Trump continues his isolation inside the White House after being taken to the hospital for “mild symptoms” of COVID-19, his re-election campaign is advertising multiple ads on Facebook, informing viewers that he “may be immune” to the deadly disease.
The campaign is running more than 80 versions of the ads, according to VICE. It is suspected of going after voters in certain states nationwide.
In the ads, Trump is seen after he returned home from Walter Reed National Military Medical Center. He saluted Marine One after he took off his face mask, which is recommended for all citizens in America to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.
“Don’t let it dominate you, don’t be afraid of it,” Trump said.
He then admitted to knowing the risks he was taking by not following the advice of public health officials.
“I know there is a risk, there is a danger, but that’s ok. Now I’m better, and maybe I’m immune, I don’t know,” he said.
There is a total of 90 versions of the ad currently running with the cost of promoting the ads at $300,000, and a viewership of more than 1.3 million.
“Trump speculating that he may be immune in a video clip where he repeatedly tells users not to let fear of COVID-19 ‘dominate’ their lives, after months of spreading medical misinformation in order to downplay the pandemic, is extremely dangerous,” Natalie Martinez, a disinformation researcher with MoveOn, non-profit, progressive public policy advocacy group, told VICE News.
“If Trump had just said ‘I’m immune’ to COVID-19 a couple of days after having been diagnosed, I think it would have been a clear violation of Facebook’s misinformation ad policy and would have been removed if it was debunked by Facebook’s independent fact-checking network,” Martinez said. “But because he added ‘maybe’ and ‘I don’t know,’ his claim becomes more speculative than statement, and may not actually violate Facebook’s misinformation ad policy.”
She continued that “if all it takes is speculative language to bypass Facebook’s misinformation policy, then it’s a bad policy. By allowing Trump to run these ads, Facebook is profiting off of medical and political misinformation.”
