FACT-CHECK: False! US President Trump Had No Official Meeting, Support for Tinubu’s Re-election

BY: Toheeb Babalola

Claim: 

A post claimed the President of the United States of America (USA), Donald Trump, has officially supported the incumbent President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, for the forthcoming General Election in 2027.

Verdict:

No official statement or physical meet-up emanated from the White House and Aso Rock. AI-generated Image was detected.

Full Text:

Nigerians are preparing for the 2027 General Elections to elect or re-elect their leaders for national and subnational public offices. The country’s electoral body, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), had concluded the political parties’ primary elections in May.

The incumbent President, Bola Tinubu, emerged as the Presidential candidate and flagbearer of the All Progressives Congress (APC) and is set to battle with the opposition leaders, such as Atiku of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), Peter Obi of Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC) and others, for the presidency.

On June 3, 2026, an X user with the username @oluremitinubu, an account allegedly operated by the First Lady Oluremi Tinubu,  claimed (archived here) that the President of the United States of America (USA), Donald Trump, has officially supported Bola Tinubu’s re-election.

The post was accompanied with a picture of Mr Trump, who was in a suit and red tie, shaking hands with Mr Tinubu, who was wearing native attire, with flags of both countries behind them. It depicted a physical diplomatic meeting.

Even though a similar claim had been fact-checked here, the comment section was still confused.

An X user Desmond GE (@DesmondGE2013 commented: “How true is it, our first lady? Trump support is good but he’s a one man show only. Nigerians need a better life, and only majority of Nigerians that are living in a better life through your husband, our president that can do the wonders for him.”

UncoverTheTruth @uncoverthetrut said: “He supported him while planning to arrest him the moment he steps his foot in US.”

“So as you dey so common sense you know get which news talk this on Una done use Ai pass people way product am.”  Another User @ktochi12 reacted.

Verification:

FactcheckAfrica surfed through the official press releases from the Nigeria’s State House and the US White House to track potential diplomatic meetings of Mr. Tinubu and Mr. Trump

We discovered a statement dated on April 13, 2025, acknowledging a meeting of Mr. Trump’s Senior Advisor to Africa,  Mr. Massas Boulos, with the Nigerian president in Paris. 

The State House described the meetup as a strategic economic and security partnership between Nigeria, Africa and the US.  However, FactcheckAfrica inserted the keywords “Tinubu and Trump” on White House’s website, and no record of the  meeting was documented.

Seven months later, Nigeria’s Minister for Information and Orientation Mohammed Idris confirmed to the public on Channels Television that Mr. Tinubu has neither visited nor met with the US President.

On Jun 29, 2026,  Nigeria’s Ambassador to the US, Mr. Kayode Are,  said the Trump-Tinubu meeting was likely to take place soon. It was reported by major Nigerian news media here, here, here and here.

FactcheckAfrica reversed the image. It was revealed that X user @oluremitinubu was its exact origin.

We  diagnosed the image on Image whisperer, an open-source image forensic tool, and flagged it as 99% AI-generated.

The analysis says the skin textures on both subjects (Trump and Tinubu) are excessively smooth and lack natural pores, showing characteristics of AI generation.

Forensic analysis on ImageWhisper Tool. 

“The handshake shows anatomical blending where the fingers of both men merge unnaturally, with the hand on the left appearing to have an extra or poorly defined joint structure.

The background details, particularly the golden ornament on the wall, show slight asymmetry and lack of crisp physical definition. The fabric folds on the blue traditional attire are overly stylized and smooth.

Anatomical merging in the handshake area

Unnatural skin smoothing and plastic-like textures

These observations are from AI visual inspection” 

The Exif metadata tool retrieved no camera evidence and web history of the image.

Conclusion:

There is no official statement confirming the US President’s support for Tinubu’s re-election, or diplomatic meetings with both presidents. The claim is FALSE!