Video shows former President George H. W. Bush ill, not dying, at 1992 dinner in Japan

CLAIM: Footage shows former President George H. W. Bush dying on live television.

AP’S ASSESSMENT: False. The video clip being misrepresented on social media shows Bush falling ill at a 1992 dinner with Japan’s prime minister. The late Bush died in 2018 at 94.

THE FACTS: A conspiracy theory video circulating on social media is falsely purporting to show video of the 41st president dying — nearly three decades before his actual death.

“That time President Bush Died on Live TV,” reads text on the video, a 2021 TikTok video that was shared on Instagram Sunday. “To be replaced by clone?”

The footage in fact dates to Jan. 8, 1992, and shows an episode in which Bush fell ill, collapsed and vomited at a state dinner in Tokyo with Japan’s then-prime minister, Kiichi Miyazawa.

The incident occurred ahead of Bush’s scheduled remarks, leaving Brent Scowcroft, a national security adviser to the president, to speak on his behalf.

The episode garnered prominent news coverage at the time and the White House chalked up the episode to the flu. The president told reporters aboard Air Force One that he quickly recovered and described it as a 24-hour bout.

Bush died in 2018, just eight months after the death of his wife of seven decades, Barbara.

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This is part of AP’s effort to address widely shared misinformation, including work with outside companies and organizations to add factual context to misleading content that is circulating online. Learn more about fact-checking at AP.

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