Patris Pustina
Claim: The official Russian archives published Kamala Harris’s membership card in the Soviet Communist Party
Verdict: False
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The news that the American Vice President and candidate for president in the November 2024 elections, Kamala Harris, was once a member of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union has recently been circulating online in Albanian.
According to an article of the mast.al portal, dated August 19, 2024, the State Archive of the Russian Federation has made public a membership card of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, allegedly proving that Kamala Harris was a member.
The Alleged Membership Card
The article claims that her membership card in the Communist Party of the former Soviet Union was issued in June 1984, after Harris’s visit to Russia. Furthermore, it alleges that ‘Harris made three trips to the Soviet Union in the 1980s, traveling to Moscow and Voronezh under the care of the Komsomol Organization (the communist youth) of the USSR.‘
However, the aforementioned image is not genuine. Its format aligns with the template of the Russian website Stalinanavas.net, where any user can generate ‘documents’ from the Soviet era, including an order from the Stalinist secret police, the title of Hero Mother, and a membership booklet for the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
To generate the membership card, the website allows users to upload a photo to accompany the fabricated document.
The photo of Harris in the image circulating online is not from 1984 but from 1986, the year she graduated from university. There is no evidence that Harris traveled to the Soviet Union during this time.
Furthermore, the article cites a post from August 19 by the Russian State Archive as a source. The only post from this institution on August 19 has nothing to do with Kamala Harris at all.
