Real or AI? · Latest checks · Checked 3 October 2026

Donald Trump seen through a plane window, beside a large printed sheet: real or AI?

Short answer: this is real. The evidence is set out below.

Photo by Brendan Smialowski / AFP via Getty Images. Posted on X by @PollTracker2024 · Shown as an embedded post · Source

The answer: it is real

Brendan Smialowski, a photographer for the news agency AFP, took this through the window of the president's plane after it landed at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland on 16 September 2026. Getty Images published it that day. People online asked whether it was real, and Snopes checked it and rated it true.

The tells

The letters on the sheet are clean and are cut off by the edge of the window, as they would be in a real photo. The cap, the hair and the small flag all look normal. But nothing in a picture can prove it is real. The proof here is that we know who took it and when.

How we know

• Published fact-check: Snopes, 18 September 2026
• Original source: Getty Images, photo by Brendan Smialowski (AFP), 16 September 2026

We only use a picture in the game when its origin is proven. Read how we check.

How to check something like this yourself

1. Search for the picture itself. Put it into Google Lens or TinEye and look for the oldest and sharpest copy.
2. Find who posted it first. See what they said about it and what else they post. Makers of AI pictures often say so, and that label is lost when the picture is copied.
3. Look for a fact-check. Search the main claim with the words “fact check”. Anything widely shared has usually been looked at.
4. Then look closely. Zoom in on hands, writing, edges and the background.

A real picture can look fake. Odd light, unusual lenses and heavy compression all make genuine images seem wrong, which is why the source matters more than the look. See real photos people swear are fake.

Full guide: How to reverse-search a picture.

More like this