FOOTAGE FROM DONALD Trump’s first TV ad originally believed to show Mexicans streaming across the US border is actually from Morocco.
During the video a narrator says of Trump: “He’ll stop illegal immigration by building a wall on our southern border that Mexico will pay for” while footage shows a large crowd of people streaming across a border.
PolitiFact has traced the ‘Mexican’ footage back to Italian television network RepubblicaTV. On 3 May 2014, it posted footage of migrants crossing the border into Melilla, a small Spanish enclave on the mainland of Morocco.
When asked about the video, Trump’s campaign manager Corey Lewandowski told NBC News: “No s***, it’s not the Mexican border but that’s what our country is going to look like. This was 1,000% on purpose.”
Lewandowski later emailed a statement to the station that said:
The use of this footage was intentional and selected to demonstrate the severe impact of an open border and the very real threat Americans face if we do not immediately build a wall and stop illegal immigration. The biased mainstream media doesn’t understand, but Americans who want to protect their jobs and their families do.
The ad also discusses Trump’s plan to temporarily ban all Muslims immigrants and tourists from entering the US.
According to the latest NBC poll, Trump remains the Republican presidential frontrunner with 35% support – compared to 18% for Ted Cruz and 13% for Marco Rubio.
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