Rumors of immigrants attacking family pets started as loosely-founded anecdotes shared at government meetings and on social media, but really took off after AI-generated images and videos that turned the stories into memes went viral.
Even before former President Donald Trump shocked viewers during Tuesday night’s debate by saying immigrants “eat pets” earlier this week, the topic was gaining momentum as accounts of celebrities, including tech billionaire Elon Musk, shared cartoon-like images created with artificial intelligence.
Using a variety of AI apps, including Musk’s Grok service and a Chinese-owned app, people created adorable, sometimes racist images and videos in seconds to promote the idea that President Trump protects animals but Vice President Kamala Harris does not.
The images and videos were then shared and reshared, some of which have been viewed tens of millions of times, and even appeared on Trump’s own social media accounts.
Some of the images shared by social media users were blatantly bigoted, depicting black people chasing cats. One commonly shared example shows an AI-generated version of Trump running through a field with a cat under his arm, pursued by two shirtless black men.
While many AI experts feared this year that realistic deepfakes posed a major threat to public discourse due to their ability to create believable audio and video of presidential candidates, the election has been shaped in large part by obviously fake, AI-made joke images that were rapidly produced to suit various lines of attack (real or not). These images and videos, whether or not based in truth, often create more compelling, shareable posts.
AJ Bauer, an assistant professor of journalism at the University of Alabama who studies conservative media, said the images show how meme-making has become further democratized.
“You don’t even need to know a thing or two about Photoshop anymore,” he said, referring to the popular photo-editing software made by Adobe.
“This certainly accelerated the meme-ification of the ‘eating cats and dogs’ trope,” he added. “Without AI it might have taken a little longer, it might have been less widespread, but because of AI I think it’s spread a lot faster and on a much larger scale.”
Bauer said the AI was particularly useful in this case because Trump is notoriously disliked by pets and there are relatively few actual photos of him with animals — unlike other presidents, Trump has not kept any pets in the White House.
While the allegations that Haitian immigrants are kidnapping and eating family pets are unfounded, they are having real-world consequences in places like Springfield, Ohio, the epicenter of the rumors, where bomb threats have targeted local schools and government buildings, leaving some Haitian immigrants fearing for their safety.
But cat-related memes have a unique and long-lasting power on the internet, from Grumpy Cat to “I Can Has Cheezburger?”
“When you combine the demonization of immigrants with cute cat content, it invites people who don’t necessarily agree with the demonization of immigrants to play the game,” Bauer said. “Who doesn’t like cute cats?”
The AI-generated pet memes were notable for their diversity: there was a cat holding a military rifle for self-defense, a cat holding a political sign, a cat and a duck sitting side by side, an AI-generated human holding a cat-related sign, and a cat and a duck being hugged by Trump.
And it has come like a tsunami, with countless videos and images uploaded to social media platforms like Reddit, X, TikTok and Instagram since last weekend.
Some of the videos and images were accompanied by captions explaining the meme — “Donald Trump saving kittens in Springfield, Ohio,” X’s post read — while others were more subtle, with text like, “Save them!” — and some had no explanation.
AI-generated pet-related images in support of Harris appear to be relatively rare, but social media users shared one image, one of Harris holding a dog and holding a sign that read “Dog for Harris.”
Imran Ahmed, CEO of the anti-hate nonprofit Center for Countering Digital Hate, said the meme reveals people who enjoy having fun at the expense of racial minorities.
“The reaction from racists is gleeful. The reaction from most normal people ranges from confusion to open anger and opposition, depending on how immersed they are in the arcane culture of the internet,” Ahmed said.
He said the meme was also a warning about the current state of media.
“Our democracy cannot allow false images to dictate speech,” he said.
Late last Sunday, far-right activist Jack Posobiec posted an AI image to X of Trump running while holding a cat and a duck and being chased by a group of black people. The post had been viewed 1.3 million times as of Friday. He also posted a six-second video of Trump holding a cat and being chased by a group of zombies, which had been viewed 3.5 million times. Posobiec did not respond to a request for comment.
On Monday morning, multiple X accounts posted an AI image of Trump being chased by a black man holding two kittens. The image made its way to the @LibsofTikTok account on Tuesday, where it has been viewed 4.8 million times. The image was eventually featured on Jimmy Kimmel’s late-night show after the presidential debate. The @LibsofTikTok account did not respond to a request for comment.
The X account for Republican members of the House Judiciary Committee posted what was perhaps the most-viewed post on Monday: a photo of President Trump in chest-deep water embracing a duck and a cat. As of Friday, it had been viewed more than 87 million times. Republican members of the House Judiciary Committee did not respond to requests for comment.
On Tuesday, Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) printed the post on a large billboard and displayed it at a committee hearing, asking Republicans, “Oh my goodness, is this OK?”
After all, Trump himself posted several AI images to his social media app, Truth Social, feed on Tuesday and Thursday, including one of him sitting on a private jet surrounded by animals.
The Trump campaign did not respond to a request for comment.
“Anyone with access to generative AI could create dozens of these images in a matter of seconds,” says Alice Marwick, research director at the nonprofit research organization Data & Society.
Marwick likened the images and videos to instant comic strips, with vibrant colors, attention to detail and easy-to-understand messages. And for most people, AI-generated content is still novel, which adds to its appeal.
“Their influence is incredibly large and their potential for proliferation is very high,” she said, but added that “to get that picture, you need to have a mindset that immigrants are dangerous.”
Marwick said the whole affair was, in some ways, an extension of the strategy Trump and his allies used to put him in the White House in 2016.
“Since 2016, we’ve kind of been dealing with the meme economy in politics,” she said.
Consumers can currently choose from a variety of AI image generators to create images with simple text commands. Many of them have rules to prevent election misinformation, such as banning the creation of images of Harris or Trump, but some do not.
At least two of the widely viewed AI videos of Trump and animals were made using software from Chinese AI startup MiniMax, according to watermarks on the videos.
One of them, posted to X on Sunday afternoon, shows Trump kissing and stroking the back of a duck’s head with the caption “I love you. I’m not going to feed you to Haitians,” and had been viewed 2.4 million times as of Friday.
MiniMax and X did not respond to requests for comment about allegations that their services were used to create such images.
