Is it true that the Ukrainian military burned an effigy of Trump and his books in 2025?

In February 2025, videos circulated in the media and social networks in which military personnel of the Ukrainian Armed Forces allegedly took revenge on the American president for his position towards Ukraine. We have verified the authenticity of these videos.

As reported in publications, against the backdrop of US President Donald Trump’s steps to end the war in Ukraine and his harsh statements against Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky, the Armed Forces of Ukraine decided to take revenge on the American politician and held two actions that were filmed. In the first video, soldiers accuse Trump that because of his decisions, weapons were not sent to President Zelensky and for this he will “repay with blood,” after which they burn his effigy. In the second, the military (presumably others) say they don't want Trump's peace plan and burn copies of the Ukrainian-language edition of his book The Art of the Deal. The publications also included screenshots of posts by a certain American blogger who posted one of the videos on X; it allegedly caused massive anger among Americans.

One or both actions were reported "Komsomolskaya Pravda", "Moskovsky Komsomolets", TV channel "Constantinople" and other Russian media, as well as numerous Telegram channels, including "KB"(256,000 views at the time of writing this analysis), Colonelcassad (231,000), "Uncle Slava» (178,000), Voblya (146,000) and Rus_criminal (114,000).

Soon after Trump's inauguration, relations between the United States and Ukraine deteriorated. They reached the peak of tension in mid-February, when the White House went on direct negotiation with the Kremlin without the participation of Ukraine, and then started demanding from Kyiv to reimburse multi-billion dollar aid through access to Ukrainian natural resources. Zelensky several times refused sign the relevant agreements, emphasizingthat they would place a heavy burden on future generations, and the previous American administration did not require subsequent compensation for military and other support. At the end of the month Financial Times And other media reported that the deal has been preliminarily agreed and is close to signing.

It’s easy to notice that the two viral videos were filmed in different weather: the first one is either spring or autumn, and the second one shows snow. In addition, in the first video, people introducing themselves as Ukrainian military officers utter the phrase “You will never become president again” addressed to Trump. 22nd amendment to the US Constitution prohibits any citizen of the country from holding the highest office for more than two terms, so the phrase presented as a threat to Trump sounds ridiculous - victory in the November 2024 elections was his second.

The fact is that the first wave of distribution of this video occurred in the spring of 2024, when it posted in large Russian-language Telegram channels. The words of the heroes of the video about the lack of arms supplies then were probably due to the fact that the US Congress couldn't agree about the allocation of more than $60 billion in aid to Ukraine, and discussions slowed down Trumpist Republicans. In addition to some oddities in the video itself (the faces of the fighters are hidden, stripes with surnames cannot be seen, the unit is not named, the words in Ukrainian are pronounced with a noticeable Russian accent), noteworthy is the fact that the pro-Russian Telegram channel was the first to post the appeal “Ukraine news» May 2 at 11:31 Moscow time. It was immediately deleted, but after a few minutes published again. The post said that the video was allegedly distributed by a popular Ukrainian channel “Trash Ukraine", and his logo was present in the video. However, “Verified” was unable to find traces of such a publication through the TGStat service, which also records deleted posts. Moreover, employees of the fact-checking department of the Swedish television channel SVT contacted with the administrators of Trukha, and they denied the fact that the video was published on their channel, noting that its logo was used illegally. Despite the denial, in November 2024 the video surfaced again - among others then his posted in X pro-Russian English-language account @mylordbebo, previously repeatedly distributing other fakes that were analyzed by Verified. That is, in February 2025, this video is used to illustrate the attitude of the Ukrainian military towards Trump for at least the third time.

This wave of video sharing began after it was posted on X by an English-speaking user on February 18 @BGatesIsaPyscho, who in his posts often supports pro-Russian narratives. The video has been viewed more than 780,000 times. To a viral post (and very real angry comments to it) noticed Russian-language Telegram channels, which, under the guise of fresh started sharing this and another video.

The second video, about Trump’s book burning, is also not new. It circulated with similar signatures in November 2024, after Trump won the presidential election. Soon the authenticity of the video dismantled "Checked." It turned out that on the uniform of the supposed Ukrainian Armed Forces fighters there was an outdated Azov brigade insignia, as well as an incorrectly placed and incorrectly drawn combined arms insignia of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, while the voice-over not only speaks Ukrainian with an accent, but makes quite serious phonetic and spelling errors. As in the case of the video where an effigy of Trump is burned, this recording was not widely distributed on pro-Ukrainian channels, but was first posted by the pro-Kremlin channel “Voice of Mordor,” which has repeatedly appeared in “Verified” analyzes as the primary source of disinformation.

Thus, both videos, distributed in February 2025, were first published in pro-Kremlin Telegram channels several months ago and have all the signs of being staged.

Cover photo: social networks

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