--- title: Donald Trump Repeats False Pig's Blood Story in California description: Donald Trump repeated his debunked story about General John Pershing shooting Muslims with pig's blood at a large California rally Thursday. canonical: https://time.com/4312131/donald-trump-pigs-blood-muslim-story/ author: Tessa Berenson article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-04-29T11:33:46.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T07:55:43.155Z article:section: Politics og:title: Donald Trump Repeats False Pig's Blood Story in California og:description: Donald Trump repeated his debunked story about General John Pershing shooting Muslims with pig's blood at a large California rally Thursday. og:url: https://time.com/4312131/donald-trump-pigs-blood-muslim-story/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt1d3ff052e9d8f9ab/6988912cbc6cfc08bb3dcc60/donald-trump-rally-california-2016-election-clash-01.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIMEPOL Donald Trump og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Donald Trump Repeats False Pig's Blood Story in California twitter:description: Donald Trump repeated his debunked story about General John Pershing shooting Muslims with pig's blood at a large California rally Thursday. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt1d3ff052e9d8f9ab/6988912cbc6cfc08bb3dcc60/donald-trump-rally-california-2016-election-clash-01.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Trump Repeats False Pig's Blood Story at California Rally ## Video: Watch When Donald Trump Rallies Get Violent [Watch (HLS stream): Watch When Donald Trump Rallies Get Violent](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/4a2eqSrA.m3u8) (2:34)  _Published 2016-03-10_  by [Tessa Berenson](https://time.com/author/tessa-berenson/)  ## Tessa Berenson Apr 29, 2016 11:33 AM UTC  Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump greets supporters after a rally, Thursday, April 28, 2016 in Costa Mesa, Calif. Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump greets supporters after a rally, Thursday, April 28, 2016 in Costa Mesa, Calif.Chris Carlson—AP  by [Tessa Berenson](https://time.com/author/tessa-berenson/)  ## Tessa Berenson Apr 29, 2016 11:33 AM UTC Donald Trump repeated his debunked story about General John Pershing shooting Muslims with pig’s blood at [a large California rally](http://time.com/4312071/donald-trump-protesters-rally/?xid=homepage) Thursday. According to Trump, around the time of the Philippine-American War of 1899-1902, Pershing killed 49 Muslims with bullets dipped in pigs blood, and “the fiftieth person, they said, ‘Take this bullet and bring to back to all of the people causing the problem,’” said Trump in Costa Mesa, CA. “And for 42 years they didn’t have a problem.” **Read More:** [The Real Story Behind Donald Trump’s Pig’s Blood Slander](http://time.com/4235405/donald-trump-pig-blood-muslims-story/) For Muslims, ingesting pork is a sin, and pig’s blood is considered unholy. But as I reported back in February after another rally where Trump told the tale, [it isn’t true](http://time.com/4235405/donald-trump-pig-blood-muslims-story/). Brian McAllister Linn, a history professor at Texas A&M University who is an expert in the Philippine conflict, remembers looking into this story with Frank Vandiver, who wrote a biography of Pershing and passed away in 2005. “We both checked our notes and found no evidence to support this,” Linn told TIME. “We also concluded it was out of character.” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4312131/donald-trump-pigs-blood-muslim-story/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4312131/donald-trump-pigs-blood-muslim-story/"},"headline":"Trump Repeats False Pig's Blood Story at California Rally","datePublished":"2016-04-29T11:33:46.000Z","dateModified":"2026-08-04T07:55:43.155Z","description":"The rally preceded violence in Orange County","url":"https://time.com/4312131/donald-trump-pigs-blood-muslim-story/","keywords":["Donald Trump"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt1d3ff052e9d8f9ab/6988912cbc6cfc08bb3dcc60/donald-trump-rally-california-2016-election-clash-01.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Tessa Berenson","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/tessa-berenson/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt1d3ff052e9d8f9ab/6988912cbc6cfc08bb3dcc60/donald-trump-rally-california-2016-election-clash-01.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"TIMEPOL Donald Trump","caption":"Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump greets supporters after a rally, Thursday, April 28, 2016 in Costa Mesa, Calif.","creditText":"Chris Carlson—AP","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/donald-trump/","name":"Donald Trump"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4312131/donald-trump-pigs-blood-muslim-story/","name":"Trump Repeats False Pig's Blood Story at California Rally"}}]},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"Watch When Donald Trump Rallies Get Violent","description":"","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/4a2eqSrA/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2016-03-10T23:17:03.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/4a2eqSrA.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/4312131/donald-trump-pigs-blood-muslim-story/","duration":"PT2M34S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/4312131/donald-trump-pigs-blood-muslim-story/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}}] ```