A viral image claiming to show the cover of TIME magazine titled 'Man of the Ear' featuring a photo of former United States president Donald Trump where his right ear is seen covered with a dressing, is fake.
The fake image is in circulation following the attack on Trump which took place during his rally in Butler, Pennsylvania on July 13, 2024.
While the viral image is fake, TIME magazine published a cover featuring a photograph of Trump following the attack, with a caption stating, "Former president survives shooting with nation on edge".
The US Secret Service is facing scrutiny over how its agents secured the site of the campaign rally and responded to the shooting incident, the New York Times reported.
The incident triggered a wave of misinformation and unfounded conspiracy theories on social media platforms such as X.
Columnist Shobhaa De posted the viral picture with a caption, "Brilliant".
Click here to view the post and here for an archive.
Fact Check
BOOM has previously debunked several fake images purporting to be TIME covers, particularly those featuring politicians.
We noticed that the purported TIME cover did not mention a publication date. In 2017, TIME magazine published an article to help its readers distinguish a fake TIME cover from a real one.
According to TIME, most fake covers either have their logo stretched vertically, the word TIME tracked out too much (space between the characters), or the logo in a different font. The article also mentioned that, aside from the creativity and typography, a genuine cover will feature a thin white border separating the iconic red frame from the photograph.
In this case, we noticed that the viral cover lacks the thin white border that would have typically separated the photograph of Trump from the red frame.
We also checked TIME magazine's archive of 2024 covers but found no cover featuring the photo of Trump's recent ear injury and calling him "Man of the Ear." Below are the covers from TIME magazine published between January and July 2024.
However, we found that on July 14, 2024, TIME from their official X handle posted a cover for their August 5, 2024, edition featuring a photograph of Trump's ear injury with the title "Attack on Trump".
Click here to view the post.
We also found that a similar fake cover can be easily created using Kapwing - an online editing tool, where anyone can use their 'Person of the Year' template to make a mockup and name their own person of the year.
Below is a comparison between the viral cover image and a mockup created using the template with the "Man of the Ear" headline.