this post was submitted on 20 Apr 2025
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Summary

Trump reportedly held up a digitally altered image of the hand of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Maryland man who was deported by the Trump administration, in an attempt to prove Garcia is a gang member.

Trump can be seen holding a printed-out photo... demonstrating that "MS-13" is tattooed across his knuckles.

"This is the hand of the man that the Democrats feel should be brought back," Trump posted. However, many have pointed out that the image appears photoshopped.

"MS-13 looks like it was typed on the photo." "Needing to have a photo doctored... is definitely something a psychopath would do."

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[–] techclothes@lemmy.world 11 points 1 day ago

Even if it wasn't. We don't throw people in jail, much less deport them for tattoos. I know some people in thr Trump shitshow who should go to jail for their tattoos if this is what they want to start doing.

[–] barneypiccolo@lemm.ee 24 points 1 day ago

What insults me more than anything is that he thinks I am so stupid that I would accept that obviously doctored photo as real. I felt the same way when he pitched his hurricane weather map with his Sharpie edit.

Hey, HitlerPig, we aren't all as stupid as you, and the people around you.

[–] Boddhisatva@lemmy.world 71 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

It's nice to see Trump can learn and grow. It wasn't that long ago when he would have just scribbled it with a sharpie. Anyway, it must really annoy Trump that thanks to Senator Van Hollen's visit, where he proved he could do what Trump admitted that he himself could not, we now have unadulterated photos of Garcia's hand without the shitty photoshop.

[–] theacharnian@lemmy.ca 75 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (3 children)

At this point, the guy could be a rabid neonazi pedophile for all I care: he should still not have been deported without a trial. People are presumed innocent until proven guilty in court. Do your fucking job.

[–] spicehoarder@lemm.ee 18 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Why would a cop get deported?

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[–] Pavidus@lemmy.world 250 points 2 days ago (2 children)

Alright, I'll take the bait. Let's all assume he has an MS-13 tattoo. What does this change? The dude still gets his constitutional rights, and his day in court. On US soil.

[–] jacksilver@lemmy.world 133 points 2 days ago (2 children)

This is what they always do, get you arguing about something that doesn't matter. Just eats up time and energy about nothing.

[–] MBech@feddit.dk 22 points 2 days ago (2 children)

I think this whole Garcia deportation is part of that. It wasn't supposed to in the beginning, but they're cooking with what they have.

Instead of talking about how fucking insane it is to deporting people to a death camp without any due process. We're now talking about how insane it is to deport someone who wasn't "supposed" to be deported to a death camp, and then refuse to do the bare minimum to get him back.

They've made sure we ignore the hundreds of people getting removed with no sign of evidence against their crimes.

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[–] Mog_fanatic@lemmy.world 33 points 2 days ago

And on top of all that, even if somehow you could justify foregoing due process, the dude STILL can't legally be sent to El Salvador because of his withholding of removal to that country which I'm pretty sure is what the"administrative error" was that the white house admitted lol.

[–] RizzoTheSmall@lemm.ee 6 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

You wanna bring up possibility of criminal history as an argument against someone being entitled to their rights as a US citizen? Let's not throw big and obvious stones in very precarious glass houses.

[–] troglodytis@lemmy.world 52 points 2 days ago (1 children)

So umm.... What's the problem? Return. Prove it in a court of law. Due process for all. It doesn't matter who the person is or what they've done. What matters is how the government acts.

[–] Boddhisatva@lemmy.world 17 points 2 days ago (1 children)

The problem is that they are trying to do away with due process. They want to be able to throw anyone they want into a gulag in another country where they will disappear forever. They start with immigrants, claiming that they are gang members and terrorists. They are refusing to prove it because they want to set the precedent that they do not need to prove their claims. They start with alleged foreign gang members, then will come "homegrowns," as Trump has called them.

If we don't make them prove their claims now in a court of law, it'll be that much harder to do it later, and they know it.

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[–] ExLisper@lemmy.curiana.net 40 points 2 days ago (11 children)

Ok, so what happened here is that police added letters to the photo explaining what each symbol means. Some idiots on twitter thought those added letters are the claimed MS-13 tattoo. It's not clear if Trump also thought that those letters were actually tattooed, probably yes.

[–] borari@lemmy.dbzer0.com 12 points 2 days ago (2 children)

Bruh. So they went from M to S to 1 to 3? Instead of A to B to C … to 1 to 2 to 3?

No. Don’t try to muddy the waters and spread more supposition as fact. Trump has already been proven to alter images to fit his own internal incorrect narrative, just look at that hurricane path incident from his last term. All evidence and common sense points to someone digitally editing this picture in order to fabricate support for this man’s illegal deportation.

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[–] Squorlple@lemmy.world 137 points 2 days ago (12 children)

Here’s a closeup of the image

A Nigerian prince puts more effort into fooling people.

[–] Nikelui@lemmy.world 84 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (6 children)

Wait, the letters are clearly digitally added on top of the photo, but aren't they just used to label the tattoos on each finger?

Not that would change anything...

[–] Squorlple@lemmy.world 61 points 2 days ago (1 children)

If they wanted to indicate a translation for the symbols, they could have done so off of the part of the image consisting of the hand. Trump said verbatim “he’s got MS-13 tattooed onto his knuckles”. Not symbols for MS-13, the phrase itself. Additionally, the real tattoos are clearly not on the knuckles, but the photoshopped letters are. Trump believes the photoshopped letters are actual tattoos and/or wants to convince people of it.

[–] floofloof@lemmy.ca 38 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (1 children)

He should have used a sharpie. It would be more convincing than the pixelated font that doesn't align wit the hand at all.

I have to think someone overlaid text on the photo to persuade people that the pictures on the fingers represented MS13, but Trump got the wrong end of the stick, made an idiot of himself in front of the media, and no one dared tell him he was a fucking moron.

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[–] CosmicTurtle0@lemmy.dbzer0.com 20 points 2 days ago (1 children)

There are five possibilities:

  • Trump was given this as proof that the guy is really a gang member, didn't ask if it was fake, presented it without vetting it
  • Trump ordered someone to find proof that he's in a gang and someone gave it to him as proof
  • Trump ordered someone to create proof that he's in a gang
  • Trump was given this as proof, he asked if it was fake, and was told the truth, and presented it anyway
  • Trump was given this as proof, asked if it was fake, was lied to, and presented it

All of these have problems.

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[–] Uppp@lemm.ee 22 points 2 days ago (1 children)

How much more do they need to impeach this liar ?

[–] Draegur@lemm.ee 16 points 1 day ago (3 children)

Look. I wish he could be removed by impeachment. But we need to accept that he's an outlaw.

He is a clear proponent of extrajudicial capital punishment.

Only an overdose of his own medicine will take him down.

[–] RealFknNito@lemmy.world 6 points 1 day ago (1 children)

The only two things that could remove Trump early is a military coup, an armed revolution, or both.

[–] MyNameIsIgglePiggle@sh.itjust.works 6 points 1 day ago (1 children)

A sniper or cyanide could also work.

Or a Luigi

[–] RealFknNito@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago

An assassination would put Vance up. The entire admin is the same or worse.

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[–] HellsBelle@sh.itjust.works 9 points 1 day ago (6 children)

Who do I trust?

A lying asswipe who wouldn't know the truth if it slapped him in his orange face?

A man I don't know that has been sent to a foreign nation's prison for no reason?

Easy choice.

[–] Guns0rWeD13@lemmy.world 7 points 1 day ago

the individual is not the issue. it's the process. i'm not going to go to bat for some rando who might very well be involved in nefarious shit, but i will damn sure defend the idea that every person is allowed a chance to defend themself. this is the issue. people need to stop treating this dude like a saint. it could very well backfire.

in fact, leftists and liberals in general need to stop automatically assuming the opposite of everything a conservative claims is true. that's a fucking trap and it's illogical.

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[–] SSNs4evr@leminal.space 10 points 1 day ago

Trump - "I bet photoshop is one of those computer thingies...I definitely didn't use that."

[–] Carmakazi@lemmy.world 91 points 2 days ago (14 children)

It kind of looks like annotation to imply that the symbols actually on his hand mean MS-13, but I'd easily believe Trump is dumb enough to think he has "M S 1 3" printed in Arial font on his fingers.

If it is an annotation...show us those court records, you fascist son of a bitch.

[–] JohnnyCanuck@lemmy.ca 59 points 2 days ago (9 children)

It's so obvious that the letters and numbers are there to show what the tattooed symbols represent. I feel like I'm in bizarro world that people don't understand that and think they've found some smoking gun.

It doesn't change the need for due process, but come on people.

[–] floofloof@lemmy.ca 27 points 2 days ago (3 children)

Trump's own words indicated that he thought the MS13 tattoos were on the knuckles, which is where the Arial font characters are. So either Trump doesn't know what a knuckle is, or he was speaking imprecisely, or he's a fucking moron, or all of the above.

In any case, as someone pointed out above, it's unlikely MS13 would be working with acronyms in English for their tattoos, especially acronyms in English that only 50% work because Marijuana Smiley Cross Skull says MSCS, not MS13.

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[–] WhatYouNeed@lemmy.world 9 points 1 day ago

You mean the US government had someone they considered a terrorist and instead of holding them, they released them?

[–] But_my_mom_says_im_cool@lemmy.world 20 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Even if. Have these people never heard of “ex gang members” I know a guy with gang tattoos who left the gang life 20 years ago. Should he suffer now because of his tattoos?

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[–] Hikuro93@lemmy.world 18 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

Even if that's real, which doesn't look like it, what's keeping them from forcing Mr. Garcia onto a chair, hold him down, while they tattoo it?

This administration and their dictator allies have shown to have no constraints, no guardrails, time and time again. Consistently. You can always blindly trust them to bs and lie their way through anything.

You gonna tell me people who tried to stage Mr. Garcia sipping some Margaritas by a hotel pool wouldn't stoop so low as to place fake tattoos on him? Yeah, that's the thing with dishonesty - even if you tell the truth once it's still gonna be called into question. The boy who cried wolf, and all that.

[–] Treczoks@lemmy.world 31 points 2 days ago (4 children)

As it is just a photo of a hand, it could be anyones hand.

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[–] teamevil@lemmy.world 7 points 1 day ago

I mean at least he didn't use a sharpie this time....

[–] superkret@feddit.org 6 points 1 day ago

Even if it wasn't, it would still be won't to kidnap and throw him into a concentration camp without due process.

[–] 0p3r470r@lemm.ee 39 points 2 days ago (1 children)

It’s sharpie gate all over again!

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