Associated Incidents
What happened: Both liberal and conservative social media accounts are spreading a supposed audio recording of President Donald Trump privately stating that he is changing the name of the nation's capital from the "District of Columbia" to the "District of America."
**A closer look: **In the audio clip, a voice that sounds like Trump's states: "No more Washington, D.C. I hate it. It makes no sense. They call it the District of Columbia. It's got nothing to do with Colombia. It's nowhere near Colombia. From now on, it will be Washington, D.A., District of America. No more of this Colombian nonsense."
The claim that Trump said this spread widely on social media, including TikTok, Facebook, Bluesky, and X, mostly among liberal users who criticized the purported name change, although some conservative users also shared and praised the supposed move.
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On March 13, anti-Trump X user @MAGACult2 posted the audio and said: "He is truly the dumbest MFer alive. He wants to change the name from DC to DA." The post garnered 1 million views and 15,000 likes in five days.
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Anti-Trump TikTok user @irishjerseygirl08 posted a video of herself listening to the audio with the caption, "How is this real life...?" The video accrued 167,000 views and 13,000 likes in four days.
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TikTok user Kate Monroe, a Trump supporter, discussed the supposed name change in a March 17 video and stated in the caption, "There's always a plan. The renaming of Gulf of Mexico to Gulf of America lets us drill. What's the amazing thing we can do now now [sic] with Washington DA rebrand?" The post garnered 373,000 views and 42,000 likes in one day.
**Actually: **The clip is AI-generated, according to digital forensics experts.
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University of Michigan-Dearborn computer engineering professor Hafiz Malik told NewsGuard in a March 2025 email, "It is definitely an AI-generated (deepfake) audio of President Donald Trump," a finding he said was based on "our Speaker-Specific Model (for Donald Trump), our generic deepfake detection tool, and forensics analysis."
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NewsGuard found that the now-deleted TikTok account that first published the audio, @whmole (apparently short for "White House mole"), apparently has created fake audio clips of Trump on other topics, including clips that sound like Trump advocating for the elimination of daylight saving time and the renaming of St. Patrick's Day to St. Donald's Day.
**Where D.A. may have originated: **Before the fake Trump audio was published, the name "District of America" was mentioned in a Feb. 18 X post by stand-up comedian Greg Fitzsimmons, who has previously been critical of the second Trump administration.
- With apparent sarcasm, Fitzsimmons said: "Trump truly has changed Washington. It is no longer called the District of Columbia. From now on it is the District of America."