AI-generated Trump and Musk video dupes MAGA faithful into buying fake Golden Eagles coins
AI-generated Trump and Musk video dupes MAGA faithful into buying fake Golden Eagles coins
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One video told viewers they could trade their Golden Eagles in for a Tesla or to use for investing in SpaceX. AI-created likenesses of President Donald Trump and Elon Musk have duped MAGA faithful into buying a gold coin worth just a fraction of what they believed. Victims were asked to purchase the golden eagle pendant and coins and then trade them in at Bank of America for a substantial return. Marine veteran Wesley Skelton, of Pittsburg, California, now owns $2,500 worth of Golden Eagles, and what he believed were Trump silver coins.
![[One video featuring an AI-generated Musk told viewers that Golden Eagle buyers could ‘visit any Tesla shop and trade your Trump gold eagles for a Tesla car or use them to invest in Tesla or SpaceX stocks’]](https://static.independent.co.uk/2025/02/03/16/22/SEI237167817.jpg)
"He said that he was going to help the people become millionaires. I could trade these in for cash at Bank of America. Supposedly $110,000 a piece," Skelton told ABC7. That was not the case. Skelton said he bought 324 of the Golden Eagles and hoped to make approximately $35 million. The vet said he saw the original video while he was using the Telegram app. One video featuring an AI-generated Musk told viewers that Golden Eagle buyers could "visit any Tesla shop and trade your Trump gold eagles for a Tesla car or use them to invest in Tesla or SpaceX stocks.".
Neither of those claims are true. A reporter from ABC 7 took the coins featured in the ad — which have Donald Trump's face on one side and the phrase "In God We Trust" on the back — to a coin shop to see if they had any value at all. Seth Chandler, the owner of Witter Coins, told the reporter that even touching them, he could tell the coins were not real gold, and he said he believed the silver coins were just nickel.
