It seemed like the smoking gun that proved Donald Trump was wrong: a photo of a young Kamala Harris, circulated on social media, showing her in a McDonald’s uniform back in the 1980s.
If only it were real.
As you may have heard, there’s some question over whether or not the vice president and Democratic presidential nominee ever worked at the Golden Arches. This stems from an assertion made during her abortive 2020 presidential campaign in which she said her first job was at the fast-food giant.
As for proof of this, none has been forthcoming. The closest the media has come is a “fact check” from The New York Times, which said Trump’s “allegation … appears to be false” — although their reasoning might not pass the average voter’s smell test.
“We have heard from her side and declare the matter settled”
— Kyle Smith (@rkylesmith) October 21, 2024
“Her campaign and a friend say she did,” however, doesn’t prove anything — and, despite what one assumes was a relatively exhaustive search on the part of a campaign that’s spent over $800 million, no pay stubs, photographs or records exist of the employment jaunt.
It’s important since Trump scored a major campaign W by visiting a Pennsylvania McDonald’s earlier this month and manning both the fry machine and drive-thru window while he was at it
“I’ve now worked here 15 minutes more than Kamala. She never worked here,” he said.
Haha this was one of my favorite videos of Trump working at McDonald’s yesterday 😂
“I’ve now worked here 15 minutes more than Kamala” pic.twitter.com/BQggF8PEAs
— David J Harris Jr (@DavidJHarrisJr) October 21, 2024
What’s more, a survey by Newsweek found that this helped with voters in general and with younger voters in particular.
The survey, released last week, found that 30 percent of respondents liked Trump more after the McDonald’s shift, vs. the 20 percent liked him less for it. However, 39 percent of Gen Z respondents liked him more vs. 23 percent who liked him less, a much stronger response from a demographic Harris needs to win.
But it appeared that, finally, someone had turned up photographic evidence of it — recently seen from this user, known simply as “Joanie,” on X:
Was this finally proof? There were skeptics, including this user who did his homework:
That is a picture of Suzanne Bernier who passed away from cancer in 2007. pic.twitter.com/YZaw3jyY4r
— The Esoteric Christian (@TheEsotericChr) October 26, 2024
Joanie responded, classily, with a statement saying “No the f*** it’s not.”
Spoiler alert: Yes, the F-bomb, it is. And even Snopes — a soi-disant fact-checking institution not known as a hive of secret crypto-MAGA boosterism — had to admit that this was, in fact, a digitally altered photograph.
“The original image appeared on a website dedicated to a family’s personal photos,” Snopes noted.
“The name of the young woman in the pic was Suzanne Bernier. According to the caption, she was a shift manager at McDonald’s. And though there was no date listed, the snapshot appears to have been taken in the early 1980s. According to the website, Suzanne Bernier is now deceased.”
Snopes managed to find the original picture using a tool known as a reverse image search, which allows you to place a photo in the search engine and look for similar photos which it might be derived from — something you can do yourself on image search engine TinEye.
In fact, according to Snopes, the manipulated image probably began with either a left-leaning account called Progress Matters on Facebook or an X post from a user named @TheInfiniteDude who expressly stated that the picture was false.
It’s unclear when the Progress Matters post went up, but they apologized for the post in a Saturday mea culpa without giving exact dates.
“Case closed. Now the cult can rest,” the original post said.
The case very much wasn’t closed, though, as the account noted over the weekend: “A few weeks ago, a photo was posted on our page that falsely depicted Vice President Harris in a McDonald’s uniform,” the apology read. “We have multiple contributors to this page, including interns, and while mistakes can happen, we take full responsibility.
“As soon as we became aware that the image was altered, we promptly removed it, not to conceal the error but to prevent the spread of misinformation, something we wish the other side would do.”
However, Snopes said it was likely that the image first appeared in an X post Oct. 24 by @TheInfiniteDude, captioned, “This is fake.”
This is fake. pic.twitter.com/uSlc84Pz2L
— The Infinite Dude (@TheInfiniteDude) October 24, 2024
Second Snopes article about a hoax I made https://t.co/bnFiu4P88y
— The Infinite Dude (@TheInfiniteDude) October 26, 2024
@TheInfiniteDude, as of a Sunday update to Snopes, has not confirmed whether he was the image’s creator or not.
And, in fact, the original photo is viewable via an archived version of Bernier’s website. Bernier, who was Canadian, passed away from cancer in 2007.
It wasn’t just Joanie or Progress Matters who shared the photo, either. According to the New York Post, left-wing influencer Billie Nelson issued a profanity-laced non-apology apology to “fragile” Trump supporters who criticized her for sharing the fake photo along with the caption “McF**** you @realDonaldTrump.”
“I said something that was false, apologized, took it down. This motherf***er couldn’t tell the truth if he f***ing tried,” Nelson said.
It’s worth noting, too, that as far as McDonald’s is concerned, they’re not going to be looking for any evidence of Harris’ supposed employment, either:
This is an internal statement to the McDonald’s system from the US Senior Leadership Team regarding today’s visit by the Trump campaign to a local franchisee in Pennsylvania. The statement outlines the origins of the event, the company’s response, and an invitation extended to… pic.twitter.com/1GntbmDbbY
— McFranchisee (@McFranchisee) October 20, 2024
“Though we are not a political brand, we’ve been proud to hear former President Trump’s love for McDonald’s and Vice President Harris’s fond memories working under the Arches,” the company said in an internal statement.
“While we and our franchisees don’t have records for all positions dating back to the early ’80s, what makes ‘1 in 8’ so powerful is the shared experience so many Americans have had.” (The phrase “1 in 8” refers to the number of Americans who have, according to the brand’s own messaging, worked at McDonald’s.)
Which is to say that their position is that of the New York Times: They have no evidence that she worked there except her own word, and none will likely be forthcoming before the election. Unless something radically changes between now and Nov. 5, you aren’t going to be seeing any pictures of the vice president in McDonald’s garb aside from fake ones — and the former president still has 15 more minutes working there on the record than Harris does.
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