After leveraging a false claim that he witnessed the Israeli military shoot a child dead at an American-run aid site in the Gaza Strip for national attention, Anthony Aguilar is now running for political office. Aguilar went viral last year with his claim that he saw a young Gazan boy named Amir “gunned down” by Israel’s military at a Trump administration-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) aid site. His tale landed him on major media outlets like NBC News, and on prominent podcasts, including two appearances on the Tucker Carlson Show. It also won him meetings with members of Congress, where he recounted the incident in vivid detail. The Daily Wire, however, found major inconsistencies in his story and later confirmed that the incident never happened. In fact, the child he claims was shot dead is alive. Now that his media tour has slowed down, Aguilar is running in North Carolina as a Green Party candidate. “I stand with the 62% of Americans who want a choice outside the two-party establishment,” Aguilar told The Daily Wire. “By running as a Green, I can fight for the solutions people are literally dying for — like healthcare as a human right and an end to endless war—solutions the billionaire donors will not stand for.” In July, Aguilar set the internet ablaze when he first began telling the story of the child he said was named “Amir.” The child’s name was actually Abdul Rahim Muhammad Hamden. According to Aguilar, he met the boy while working at a GHF aid site on May 28, only to watch him killed moments later. He told an emotional story of an intimate interaction with the boy before his death. On a podcast, Aguilar said he told the boy, “People care. You’re a human being and people care about you.” He said that “Amir” responded by kissing him and saying thank you in English, before he walked away and was shot dead. “He sets his food down, and he places his hands on my face — on the side of my face, on my cheeks — these frail, skeleton, emaciated hands, dirty. And he puts them on my face, and he kissed me. He kissed me, and he said, ‘Thank you,’ in English. Thank you. And he collected his items, and he walked back to the group, and then he was shot at with pepper spray and tear gas and stun grenades and bullets — shot at his feet and in the air — and he runs away, scared.” Aguilar vividly recounted the same story on several large platforms, including MSNBC, the Tucker Carlson Show, and even in an interview with a sitting Democrat senator, Maryland’s Chris Van Hollen. On Carlson’s show, released July 31, Aguilar went even further with the story, comparing the child to his own son and stating definitively that he saw the death first-hand. “I see my son’s face when I look at him,” Aguilar said. “I didn’t get this second-hand. I didn’t see it from afar and then assume. I saw it. I touched it. I felt it.” He said “Amir” was killed by the Israel Defense Forces. Almost none of what Aguilar said turned out to be true. In video footage from the day obtained by The Daily Wire, “Amir” was seen walking up another security contractor next to Aguilar and kissing his hand. He then turns to Aguilar for a brief interaction — with none of the details Aguilar laid out taking place. The contractor wearing the body cam told The Daily Wire that Aguilar’s story is “fabricated.” “There is no profound English dialog, kneeling at his level, nor does the boy drop his aid to kiss Tony and say ‘thank you’ to him in English.” Side-by-side video