DISINFO: Texas governor Abbot: Biden should learn from Putin
SUMMARY
During a Fox News interview criticising the Biden Administration's immigration policy, Texas governor Greg Abbott said: “If only the president had been dealing with real internal problems and not trying with play with Putin, from whom he needs to learn how to work for national interests, then everything would have been different”.
RESPONSE
Texas governor Greg Abbott never uttered the words quoted in this disinformation story, as the original Fox News interview, posted by Abbott to his YouTube channel, shows. As disinformation researchers from Spain’s Newtral and UK’s BBC Verify have pointed out, Abbott's voice in the second part of the clip where he mentions Vladimir Putin has been generated by artificial intelligence.
Distorting public statements from prominent officials and individuals to make them appear as backing pro-Kremlin narratives is a frequent disinformation technique. See other examples, such as claims that Borrell admitted that sanctions against Russia do not work, that Merkel and Hollande admitted that the Minsk Agreements were to prepare Ukraine for war, that Stoltenberg confirmed that Russia invaded Ukraine because of NATO, or that Czechia acknowledges the failure of Ukraine's offensive.