New Canadian Prime Minister Targeted with Jeffrey Epstein Deepfake
An AI-generated image of Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein is making rounds on social media
By Nicole Dirks and Sarah Komar
What happened: Conservative Canadian and U.S. social media users are spreading a supposed photo of Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney lounging in a swimming pool with the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, falsely claiming that Carney was implicated in Epstein’s child sex trafficking scandal.
A closer look: The photo first appeared online in January, when Justin Trudeau announced his resignation and launched the race for the next leader of the Liberal Party. It went viral soon after Carney won the vote for leader of the party on March 9.
Conservative Canadian X user @Franktmcveety posted the image on Jan. 28, 2025, superimposed with the text: “What do we have here. Mark Carney and Jeffrey the pedo. He said he had nothing to do with him.” The user added, “Well we’ll just [have] more lies from this corrupt want to be unelected liberal.” The post quickly garnered 105,800 views and 2,400 likes.
On March 10, Instagram page CanadaExpozedArmy, a conservative account, posted the image with the text, “Did you know Mark Carney is the first Canadian Prime Minister with known Jeffrey Epstein connections?” The post received 3,600 likes.
Actually: The image is AI-generated.
The image bears multiple signs of digital manipulation. For example, a woman’s wrist is improbably curved in the background and Carney’s hand appears misshaped.
The closest apparent link between Carney and Epstein is an August 2013 photo of Carney standing next to Epstein’s confidante Ghislaine Maxwell, republished on Jan. 10, 2025, in the Toronto Sun (NewsGuard Trust Score: 92.5/100). Maxwell was sentenced to 20 years in prison for sex trafficking girls for Epstein.