Fake News Alert: Posts Use Transposed Mugshot of Epstein to Target Kamala Harris

The names of more than 150 people who were associated with Jeffrey Epstein — the financier accused of running a sex-trafficking ring for him and his well-connected friends before killing himself in a Manhattan jail in 2019 — are set to be released in January.

The publication of those names — many of which have already been made public — is the result of an order to unseal hundreds of documents issued by U.S. District Court Judge Loretta Preska, who is overseeing a civil suit brought by Virginia Giuffre, one of Epstein’s accusers, against Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein’s longtime consort.

Anticipation of the release has prompted many social media users to share an old, manipulatedphoto made to suggest that Epstein was associated with Vice President Kamala Harris. There is no evidence to support any such association. Text shared with the photo further suggests that this purported relationship might shield others from being revealed.

The text says, “Maybe this is why we can’t see those flight logs,” which is a reference to lists of passengers on Epstein’s private plane. But, it’s worth noting, hundreds of pages of those flight logs have already been released.

The photo shown in the social media posts is digitally manipulated. The original picture shows Harris in 2015 with her husband, Douglas Emhoff, at the opening celebration for The Broad, an art museum in Los Angeles.

A mugshot from Epstein’s 2006 arrest on solicitation charges was transposed over Emhoff’s face to make it appear as though Epstein and Harris were photographed together. They weren’t.