WHAT WAS CLAIMED
A video shows Donald Trump, alongside King Charles, saluting as a Star Wars song plays.
OUR VERDICT
False. The US national anthem was playing when the president saluted in the original video.
AAP FACTCHECK - An edited video is being used to falsely claim Donald Trump saluted as a Star Wars villain's theme song played at a recent event with the British royals.
Authentic footage from the event shows that the US national anthem was playing when the president saluted.
The edited video has been spreading on social media after Trump's widely covered trip to the UK, where he was hosted by the British royal family last week.
One Australian Facebook post featuring the edited video has racked up 5.1 million views.
The video is captioned to suggest the King's Guard was trolling the US president by playing a theme song from the Star Wars films as he saluted.
"This doofus is way too dumb to realize he's being trolled by the British Guard," text overlaying the video reads.
"And he's saluting like it's the national anthem."
The video claims to show official Sky News coverage of the event in September 2025.
But the audio is a song called The Imperial March (Darth Vader's Theme), which was composed by John Williams as a theme for the Star Wars villain Darth Vader.
Genuine Sky News coverage from the event shows the US national anthem was playing as the US president saluted.
The edited video echoes claims featuring the same Star Wars song during Trump's 2019 visit to the UK, which were debunked by FullFact.
In the recent video, someone appears to have swapped the US anthem for audio of a British military band playing The Imperial March.
Footage on YouTube shows ceremonial Bands of the Household Division playing it, including just a few weeks earlier.
The edited video is not the only misinformation circulating on social media after Trump's recent UK trip.
An image purporting to show the president eating spaghetti as King Charles stands to speak during a banquet has also been shared widely on Facebook.
The image, however, is fake.
The president was not eating when the King made a speech at the event, as revealed in a YouTube video post by India's Hindustan Times.
The image exhibits clear signs of being manipulated using artificial intelligence, such as Trump appearing to have only four fingers on one hand.
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