Trump's AI selfies with Washington and Lincoln: what's actually going on

Key points

• Donald Trump has posted multiple AI-generated images placing himself alongside historical American figures including George Washington during a difficult political period in 2025.
• The posts come as Trump's approval ratings hit their lowest point of his second term, according to The Guardian.
• AI image generation, software that creates photorealistic pictures from a text description, makes this kind of content cheap and instant to produce.
• No AI-generated political image needs to be labelled as fake under current US federal law.
• The trend raises fresh questions about how voters should read what politicians post on social media.

Picture a photograph of Donald Trump standing shoulder-to-shoulder with George Washington. Looks real. Feels weighty. It isn't either of those things.

That image, and several like it, appeared on Trump's social media feeds in recent weeks. Each one places the sitting US president next to a towering figure from American history. All of them were made by AI image generators, tools that produce photorealistic pictures from a short written prompt in seconds at essentially zero cost.

Why is he doing this now?

The timing matters. Trump is wrestling with a war against Iran that has not ended cleanly, and his approval ratings have dropped to the lowest levels of his second term. When the news cycle is rough, reach for the visuals.

This isn't a new instinct. Trump has long understood that a single striking image can cut through hours of negative headlines. His social feeds have featured AI-generated pictures of himself with Vladimir Putin, Kim Jong-un, Kim Kardashian and others in recent years. Washington and Lincoln are simply the latest co-stars.

What's new is how easy it has become. A few years ago, producing a convincing fake photograph required skilled photo editors and real time. Today, anyone with a smartphone and a free app can do it in under a minute.

Should ordinary people be worried?

Not panicked, but aware. AI-generated political images are now a normal feature of the social media diet, and most platforms don't require politicians to label them. We covered the contrast with EU rules back on 31 July, when a new European regulation took effect requiring AI-generated content to be clearly marked.

Under current US federal law, there is no blanket requirement to mark AI-generated content in political posts. Some states have passed their own rules, but enforcement is patchy. A voter scrolling quickly could easily take a flattering AI image as evidence of something real.

The practical advice is simple: before sharing a striking political photograph, pause. Run a reverse-image search. Look for AI tells like misshapen hands or background text that doesn't quite read right. These tools are improving fast, so the errors are shrinking, but they haven't vanished yet.

There's also a bigger point worth sitting with. Associating yourself visually with George Washington doesn't make you more like George Washington. Images create feelings; they don't supply facts. Knowing that gap exists is the first defence against being moved by something manufactured.

Common questions

Is it illegal to post AI-generated images of yourself with historical figures?

No. Historical figures are long dead and hold no image rights. Creating or sharing these images is entirely legal in the United States, and no federal law currently requires politicians to label AI-generated content in their posts.

How can I tell if a political image is AI-generated?

Look closely at hands, teeth, background text and fabric patterns, areas where current AI image tools still produce small but visible errors. Running the image through a free reverse-image search will also show whether the original photograph it resembles actually exists.