Google Maps does not show 'Epstein Island' as the 2024 Democratic National Convention venue
The venue of the 2024 DNC has yet not been disclosed at the time of writing.
(Reuters) - A screenshot of Google Maps showing Little St. James Island, part of the late Jeffrey Epstein’s property portfolio (here), as the venue for the 2024 Democratic National convention depicts an unauthorized user entry that has since been removed by Google, the company said.
The Maps entry was manually created by a user and later removed for violating the company’s content policy, a Google spokesperson told Reuters. The Democratic Party has not yet announced the venue for its convention.
A tweet shared the screenshot showing Little St. James Island in satellite view with an in-picture caption that read, “Look up Epstein Island on Google Maps right now and you’ll find that the Democrat National Convention is being hosted there” (here).
The screenshot was also widely circulated on Facebook (here) and (here).
Reuters has previously debunked misleading claims about Little St. James, Epstein’s Caribbean island (here). Epstein, an American financier with high-profile celebrities and politicians among his friends, died by suicide in prison in 2019 while awaiting trial on sex-trafficking charges (here).
A search for “Epstein Island” on Google Maps shows Little St. James Island but no longer indicates that DNC 2024 will be held there (here!3m1!1e3).
However, Google confirmed an entry had been made by a user that incorrectly showed the private island as the venue for the DNC.
A Google spokesperson told Reuters via email that the platform removed the edited entry visible in the screenshot because it violated the platform’s content policy: “After looking into this specific edit, we confirmed that our team had already removed it from Maps.”
Google allows its users to make additions to Maps if the information is accurate. Deliberate fakes and incorrect content are in violation of the Maps user-generated content policy (here).
The venue of the 2024 DNC has yet not been disclosed at the time of writing.
The map screenshot circulated days after three cities - Atlanta, Chicago and New York - were shortlisted to host the convention. A final decision is expected in Spring 2023, according to ABC News (here).
The United States Democratic Party did not immediately respond to Reuters’ request for comment.
VERDICT
Missing Context. A Google spokesperson told Reuters that an edited Maps entry showing “Epstein Island” as a venue for the 2024 Democratic National Convention was removed for violating platform policy requiring that added information be accurate.
