GOP congressional candidate pushes conspiracy theory that George Floyd died in 2016

“So, George Floyd is supposedly being choked to death, and he’s crying out for his mom. We haven’t heard anything about the mom, we haven’t seen a family photo, we haven’t see any evidence of them together as a cohesive unit. Floyd might be a fake name, for all we know,” she explained in a video posted on Twitter and Parler earlier this month. “So if I was going to murder the psyche of a people, I would give this guy a Floyd name. John Floyd, George Floyd, I could get you 10 George Floyds by the end of the day. You know how you do it? You lure in a homeless man, you give him some drugs laced with poison, and you kill him. So that’s Exhibit A.”

She also claimed that former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, who was arrested for the death of Floyd, was not the person who was arrested. To support her claim that Floyd’s videotaped death last month was fake, she claimed the gas prices that can be seen in the background of the video of Floyd’s death are not compatible with the drop in gas prices that occurred amid the coronavirus pandemic.

In addition to the video, Heartstrong, who is running against Anthony Rogers in the GOP primary to take on incumbent Democrat William Lacy Clay in a heavily blue district, also posted a link to a 23-page “investigative report” she authored that supposedly proved her claims.

“We conclude that no one in the video is really one person but rather they are all digital composites of two or more real people to form completely new digital persons using deepfake technology,” the report says.

The report also claims that former NBA player Stephen Jackson, who knew Floyd for about two decades, could have “played the role of George Floyd in the deepfake video of his arrest based on two factors – physiognomy and body art.”

The claim that Jackson could have portrayed Floyd is based on a “graphic artist” who was identified as “John.”

Heartstrong’s tweet publicizing her theory is no longer visible on Twitter as of Tuesday afternoon, and she told the Washington Examiner that the candidate did not delete it on her own.

“The account you referenced has been compromised,” a Twitter spokesperson told the Washington Examiner, in response to questions about why Heartstrong’s tweet was removed. “As soon as we were made aware of the issue, we locked the compromised account and are investigating the situation.”

“In a May 31, 2020 video, I urged Americans to stop being so emotional and question everything. The video is permanently archived on Parler. It’s a short message that went viral in the United States and Europe,” Heartstrong added.

Floyd’s death last month sparked nationwide protests trying to raise awareness for systemic racism and police brutality.