Ted Cruz Duped by Fake Shark Photo Amid Tropical Storm Hilary

Senator Ted Cruz on Monday appeared to be fooled by an image of a shark swimming through flood waters on a roadway that was falsely described as having been taken in Los Angeles amid Tropical Storm Hilary.

Hilary became the first tropical storm in 84 years to make landfall in Southern California on Sunday evening, dropping heavy amounts of rainfall throughout Monday morning. As well as shattering daily rainfall records in parts of Los Angeles and the deserts of southeastern California, the storm also sparked a wave of jokes, with users sharing outlandish images and claiming that they were the result of Hilary.

One such hoax, shared by a user called "Big Cat" on X, formerly Twitter, featured an image of a flooded roadway with a shark swimming in the water, taken from a vehicle's driver-side window: "Friend of mine out in LA just took this picture on the 405 [freeway]. And yes, all news and media outlets you have permission to use this. Wild."

As was later pointed out in a community note that the image is a longtime fake, as verified by Snopes, with the shark originating in a 2005 photograph of a kayaker. The hoax image first began circulating in 2011 after Hurricane Irene hit Puerto Rico, and has reemerged intermittently online over the years, usually in the wake of major cities hit by hurricanes.

Despite this, the image seemed to fool at least one prominent figure on Monday: Texas Senator Ted Cruz, who reposted the photo and wrote simply: "Holy crap."

A bit later, the Republican senator posted again to say that he learned the photo was a joke and urged people in the storm's path to stay safe nevertheless. He wrote: "I'm told this is a joke. In LA, you never know... And everyone please stay safe from the storm or otherwise."

In the wake of his report, a number of other X users mocked Cruz for seeming to fall for what they considered to be an old trick.

"Ted Cruz just fell for Twitter's oldest hoax: the shark on the highway," journalist Ben Collins wrote on X. "This is the first time Hurricane Shark had ever visited California," hurricane expert Zach Covey wrote in his own post, with a more playful tone. "From what I hear, he's on his way to Santa Monica pier!"

"I'm told you're a joke," the official account for the anti-MAGA Republicans Against Trump group read, taking a more barbed approach.

Newsweek reached out to Los Angeles city officials for comment.