2025 survey named Trump as top peace threat? No, that's from 2019 | Fact check
The claim: 2025 report identifies Trump as 'greatest threat to world peace'
A Feb. 7 Facebook post (direct link, archive link) shows a Fox News graphic with survey results that list President Donald Trump as the world leader posing the greatest threat to global peace.
“In just under two weeks, President Trump has emerged as the frontrunner in this poll,” text in the image reads.
The Facebook post was shared more than 200 times in a week. The image also circulated widely on Instagram, Threads, Bluesky, X and elsewhere on Facebook.
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Our rating: False
The report is from 2019, not 2025.
Fox News graphic is from 2019, not Trump’s second term
The Fox News graphic displays the results of a YouGov survey of Germans who were asked which of five world leaders – Russia’s Vladimir Putin, China’s Xi Jinping, North Korea’s Kim Jong Un, Iran’s Ayatollah Ali Khamenei or Trump – represents the greatest threat to world peace. Trump, chosen by 41% of respondents, ranked first.
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But while the Facebook post was shared approximately two weeks after Trump's inauguration, the image in it is not new. It dates to 2019 and has nothing to do with the beginning of Trump’s second presidential term.
The graphic was first aired and shared on the Fox News show “Fox & Friends First” on Dec. 27, 2019, a day after news reports were published about the poll commissioned by Deutsche Presse-Agentur. It surveyed 2,000 Germans from Dec. 16-18 of that year.
Paste BN previously debunked false claims that Trump posted about the Department of Education “developing a hybrid of the fork and spoon,” blamed the Kansas City Chiefs’ Super Bowl loss on “DEI nonsense” and had an endorsement from a police union rescinded after he pardoned those who took part in the Jan. 6 Capitol riots.
Paste BN reached out to several social media users who shared the image but did not immediately receive any responses.
Lead Stories also debunked the claim.
Our fact-check sources
- Fox & Friends First, Dec. 27, 2019, X post
- Deutsche Welle, Dec. 26, 2019, Germans fear Trump more than Kim and Putin
- Axios, Dec. 26, 2019, Survey: Germans say Trump is more dangerous than Putin, Kim or Xi
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