Overview
- President Trump told reporters he did not watch the full clip and refused to apologize, saying, "I have not made a mistake."
- Officials first dismissed criticism as "manufactured" before removing the post and stating that a White House staffer published it by mistake.
- The roughly 62‑second video centered on baseless claims about 2020 election manipulation and briefly showed Barack and Michelle Obama with ape bodies set to "The Lion Sleeps Tonight."
- Fact‑checkers traced the Obama segment to an earlier AI‑generated meme circulating last year and identified a watermark linked to the account @XERIAS_X.
- Reaction spanned parties, with Gavin Newsom and Hakeem Jeffries condemning the post and Republican Senator Tim Scott calling it the most racist thing he had seen from this White House; civil‑rights voices including Bernice King and the NAACP also denounced the imagery.