Top line
Far-right figures are spreading baseless claims on social media that Vice President Kamala Harris used audio earrings to gain the upper hand in her debate against former President Donald Trump. However, these unsubstantiated claims fail to take into account the differences between the earrings Harris wore on debate night and the audio earrings she allegedly wore.
Harris listens to Trump during Tuesday’s debate. (Photo by SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images)
Key data
Far-right media personality Laura Loomer was one of the users who spread the viral claim. After the debate, she posted on X, formerly known as Twitter, a side-by-side photo of Harris and a screenshot of a Tom’s Guide article about the Nova H1 Audio Earrings, which the developers’ website says are wireless earbuds embedded in freshwater pearl earrings. As of Wednesday evening, the post had been viewed nearly 4 million times.
Jason Miller, a senior adviser to Trump, retweeted an article in which Icebach Sound Solutions, the developers of the audio earrings, said the resemblance between their audio earrings and Harris’ earrings was “striking.” He captioned the repost with the eyes emoji, which can be used to express curiosity or skepticism, while several other prominent accounts also spread unsubstantiated claims about the earrings.
Harris appeared to be wearing Tiffany & Co. South Sea pearl earrings, each of which features a pearl suspended on and slightly between two gold bars, according to photos posted by a blog titled “What Kamala Wore,” which notes that the earrings are not available online.
The Nova H1 audio earrings do not have double bars, but instead feature a single clip design for the user’s earlobes.
Malte Iversen, CEO of Icebach Sound Solutions, told Forbes that the company had no knowledge of what earrings Harris wore during the debate.
The Harris campaign declined to comment, and representatives for Tiffany and ABC News did not immediately respond to Forbes’ request for comment.
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Surprising fact
Harris was seen wearing the same earrings at a Sept. 11 memorial ceremony on Wednesday morning and appears to have worn them on other occasions, including at a rally last month in Wayne, Michigan, and at the NCAA team championship celebration in July.
News Peg
Trump accused Harris in an interview with Fox News of having seen the debate questions in advance and said ABC News, the network hosting the debate, had a “rigged broadcast with someone who may have even had the answers.” He offered no evidence for that claim and the rules of the debate stated: “No topics or questions are given to campaign teams or candidates in advance.”
tangent
After the debate, betting odds for the election were largely in Harris’ favor. According to the Election Betting Odds Tracker, bookmakers are predicting the vice president has a 51.8 percent chance of winning the election, compared to Trump (46.9%). Trump had the edge in the betting odds before the debate.
Important background
The Trump-Harris debate was seen as one of the most consequential days of the election cycle, as polls showed the candidates had entered a neck-and-neck race. Harris experienced a surge in poll numbers in recent weeks that had stagnated before the debate, leaving her with a one-percentage-point lead over Trump (49% to 48%) before the debate, according to an NPR/PBS News/Marist poll. According to The New York Times, after the debate, pundits largely either praised the vice president’s performance or criticized Trump for allowing Harris to lead him into off-topic digressions. Trump said in an interview with “Fox & Friends” that the debate was “three against one,” a criticism likely referring to the real-time fact-checking he experienced during the event. The former president also called ABC “the most dishonest news organization,” echoing criticism of ABC he made before the event. One of the most notable fact-checks against Trump came after he made the false claim that immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, were eating residents’ cats and dogs. Debate moderator David Muir cited Springfield officials who told ABC News they had not received any credible reports of immigrants in the area eating pets. Trump claimed he had seen “people on TV” saying their pets were being used as food.
More information
“They eat the dogs” and “worst” inflation: Important fact checks from the presidential debate (Forbes)
Harris overtakes Trump in election betting markets after first presidential debate (Forbes)
