Is Derek Chauvin a “crisis actor”? Fact Check

Online conspiracies claim that Derek Chauvin – the police officer who was responsible for the death of George Floyd that sparked riots across the United States – is actually a crisis actor employed by the government or “Deep State” to play a role. Other theories also claim Chauvin is actually Ben Bailey, the host of TV’s Cash Cab.

FALSE

“Crisis actor” conspiracy theories are one of the most popular types of online conspiracies that typically follow national or international events such as unlawful killings, mass shootings or terrorist attacks.

Conspiracy theorists typically claim a large number of events such as those we outline above have been staged and never really happened – referring to such events as a “false flag” – and those directly involved were actors employed by shadowy elements of the government to play a role.

In May 2020, unarmed black man George Floyd was killed by Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, sparking civil unrest throughout the country. Subsequently, conspiracy theorists claim that Derek Chauvin and even George Floyd were actors, and that the actor who played Floyd is actually still alive, and the actor who played Chauvin is not really in prison.

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The evidence offered to support such claims of covert crisis actors typically amounts to scouring the Internet for photos of people involved in previous incidents that have a vague resemblance to a person involved in a current incident and baselessly conclude that the two people must be the same person. All attached to a message to the reader to “wake up”.

That is certainly the case with Derek Chauvin, and the below image has been spreading online.

The image above offers absolutely no evidence that Chauvin is a “crisis actor” other than his apparent physical resemblance to both a Newtown police offer at the Sandy Hook school in 2012 shooting and a man pictured during the Boston marathon bombings in 2013. All of who conspiracy theorists claim are one and the same person based on these photos alone.

Even if we ignore all of the illogical and absurd assumptions one would have to make about simply inserting crisis actors into a police department to play a role, the claim that these three men are the same person is demonstrably false. The three men pictured at the Boston bombings have been identified as belonging to the National Guard’s Weapons of Mass Destruction Civil Support Team, led by Lt. Col. Matthew Woolum who confirmed that the photo is of himself and two colleagues. The Newtown police officer is Police Lieutenant David Kullgren, who responded to the Sandy Hook school shooting. Subsequent photos of Kullgren reveal that he doesn’t even have a particularly impressive resemblance to Chauvin.

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If the claims of crisis actors couldn’t get absurd enough, more baseless claims purport that Derek Chauvin is actually an actor and stand-up comedian Ben Bailey, who currently hosts TV game show Cash Cab. Again, such claims are based solely on a perceived physical resemblance between Bailey and Chauvin.

Needless to say, Bailey and Derek Chauvin are two different people, who live in different parts of the United States (Chauvin in Minneapolis and Bailey in New Jersey.) Since the evidence offered relies solely on a passing physical resemblance, we counter it with this side-by-side of the two men that show they are clearly different people.

Since there is no actual evidence offered, we’re happy to rank thee ridiculous conspiracy theories as false.

Photos claiming to show Chauvin wearing a “Make Whites Great Again” cap and smiling on stage at a Trump rally are also false.