How have fact-checkers evaluated claims that Trump called himself the 'second coming' or 'King of Israel'?
Executive summary
Fact-checkers determined that President Trump did not independently assert as literal fact that he was the “King of Israel” or the “second coming of God,” but he amplified and promoted a radio host’s hyperbolic simile that used those phrases and drew misleading headlines and social-media claims when his retweets and posts were framed as self‑declarations [1] [2]. Reporting and fact-checks note the statements came from Wayne Allyn Root and that subsequent coverage sometimes removed context, producing stronger claims than what the record shows [1] [3].
1. What was actually posted and the immediate context
The episode centers on an August 2019 tweet in which President Trump shared praise from conservative radio host Wayne Allyn Root that said, among other flattering comparisons, that “the Jewish people in Israel love him like he’s the King of Israel. They love him like he is the second coming of God,” and Trump thanked Root for the “very nice words” in quoting him [2] [3]. Root later said his language was a simile and exaggerated praise rather than a literal claim that Israelis believe Trump is a divinely anointed messiah or a formal monarch, a distinction highlighted by Snopes and other reviewers [1].
2. How major fact‑checkers evaluated the claim
Snopes’ detailed review concluded that Trump was not making a factual theological claim about being the second coming of Christ or an actual king of Israel but was amplifying Root’s rhetorical flourish; Snopes emphasized that Root framed his praise as simile and that the literal reading would be theologically incoherent for many faiths [1]. News organizations including AP reported the tweet’s text verbatim and noted Trump’s role in promoting Root’s language while also placing the post in the political uproar of the moment — notably a reaction to Trump’s separate comments about Jewish voters — which fact‑checkers used to explain why the phrase circulated and why it alarmed critics [2]. Other outlets and fact‑check pieces traced how social posts, memes and some news headlines omitted Root’s authorship and the simile framing, presenting the language as Trump’s self‑identification, a framing Snopes and independent fact‑checkers flagged as misleading [1] [4].
3. Where reporting diverged and why that matters
Some outlets ran headlines asserting Trump “declared” or “said” he was the “King of Israel” or the “second coming,” a stronger claim than the record supports, and social media memes compounded that impression by stripping the attribution and context [1] [5]. Fact‑checkers point out that the difference between amplifying someone else’s words and asserting them personally matters for truthfulness: Snopes and contemporaneous fact‑checks judged many of those stronger headlines and viral posts inaccurate because they omitted Root’s role and the simile framing [1]. At the same time, outlets such as the Times of Israel and The Standard accurately reported what Trump tweeted but also characterized the effect of the tweet — that it conveyed godlike praise and inflamed critics — demonstrating an editorial judgment about impact rather than changing the underlying textual record [3] [5].
4. Takeaway, alternative readings and limits of the record
The defensible conclusion from fact‑checks is twofold: Trump did not, in a standalone original assertion, proclaim himself to be a literal messiah or monarch, but he did visibly promote language that likened him to those roles, and many subsequent reports and social posts presented that promotion as an explicit self‑claim, a distortion flagged by Snopes and others [1] [2]. Alternative viewpoints exist: critics interpret Trump’s amplification as a performative embrace of messianic praise [6], while defenders stress that he was merely sharing a supporter’s hyperbole [1]. Available reporting documents the tweet and Root’s later clarifications, but does not—and the fact‑checks do not—prove Trump’s private intent beyond what he posted, a limitation worth noting for readers seeking to discern motive from public text [1] [2].