WHAT WAS CLAIMED
A video shows Usha Vance saying she regrets marrying the US vice president.
OUR VERDICT
False. The clip is an AI-generated deepfake.
AAP FACTCHECK - A video of Usha Vance saying she regrets marrying the US vice president and criticising him is spreading online, but it's a deepfake.
An expert says there are clear signs it was generated using artificial intelligence (AI) tools, and there's no evidence Mrs Vance made such statements about JD Vance at the event depicted in the clip.
A video posted on Threads appears to show Mrs Vance speaking of her "shame" about being called Vance's wife, and describing their marriage as a "performance".
"I regret marrying JD Vance," she purportedly says in the clip.
"You call me the wife of the vice president but those words only bring me shame, not an ounce of glory.
"What I wear, what I say and how I laugh all depend on his mood, even if I feel repulsed inside … This marriage isn't about love, it's a performance.
"You know being the wife of the vice president is far from an easy job. After all, I hold a juris doctor degree from Yale Law School."
AAP FactCheck performed a reverse image search which traced the original video back to a speech Mrs Vance gave at the Republican National Convention in July 2024.
She was introducing Mr Vance as he accepted nomination for vice president during the US election campaign.
In her original speech, she says she loves, stands by and admires her husband and that he will make a "great" US vice president.
Her outfit and the background match recordings of the speech published online, including by C-SPAN video on Instagram and ABC News on YouTube.
Niusha Shafiabady, Head of Discipline of IT at the Australian Catholic University, says there are several signs that the Threads video was created using AI.
She says the deepfake unnaturally blinks too often, and has thicker lips and shows more upper teeth than the real Mrs Vance does in the original video.
"Her face is also different. In the fake video, her face is much younger than the original video," Associate Professor Shafiabady told AAP FactCheck.
The AI expert also said the deepfake's voice was different to the voice of the vice president's wife, a variation that could be detected by voice analysis software.
AAP FactCheck found further inconsistencies in the fake clip, including the voice occasionally appearing out of sync with her mouth, which moves unnaturally.
Mrs Vance's cheek and chin freckles are not visible on the deepfake, and glitches appear around the upper jaw (timestamp 22 seconds).
The deepfake video may have originated from TikTok user @rlx13205ijw, according to Snopes.
The account has shared fake clips of US President Donald Trump and his granddaughter, Kai Trump, which have been labelled as AI-generated.
Although the deepfake of Mrs Vance appears to have since been removed, the overlay text in the TikTok account's other videos matches the font and style in the Threads video.
The same deepfake of Mrs Vance was also posted on Instagram by an account describing itself as a "digital creator".
In the authentic video, the vice president's wife reflected on meeting Vance and described him as "determined".
"That JD and I could meet at all, let alone fall in love and marry, is a testament to this great country," Mrs Vance said.
AAP FactCheck found no credible news reports about Mrs Vance making the comments in the Threads video.
AAP FactCheck is an accredited member of the International Fact-Checking Network. To keep up with our latest fact checks, follow us on Facebook, Instagram, Threads, X, BlueSky, TikTok and YouTube.
