&imwidth=800&imheight=600&format=webp&quality=medium "'Same excuse...': Trump's 2015 'intern' error post surfaces online amid backlash over Obama racist video controversy")
A decade-old social media post by US President Donald Trump has resurfaced online amid widespread criticism over a video shared by him depicting former Democratic US President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama as apes. The old post was made on X (formerly Twitter) in which Trump said that one of his intern accidentally made the tweet. Users on X widely reshared it following the Obama video controversy, stating that Trump has been using the same kind of excuse since a decade. According to CNN, the resurfaced post dates back to October 2015, when Trump faced backlash for a retweet that mocked Iowa voters for supporting his then-rival Ben Carson in opinion polls.
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In the present controversy, White House said that one of its staffer "erroneously made the post." However, Trump said that he neither fire the staffer nor apologise because he did not make a mistake. “No, I looked at the first part. It was really about voter fraud and the machines – how crooked it is, how disgusting it is. Then I gave it to the people, generally they’d look at the whole thing but I guess somebody didn’t and they posted it. And then we deleted it," Trump told reporters.
The video amplified the Republican US president’s false claims that his 2020 election defeat was the result of fraud. The racist post was deleted on Friday (Feb 6) following criticism that the U.S. President’s post evoked imagery long used to dehumanise people of African descent. “A White House staffer erroneously made the post,” said a White House official, who declined to be named. “It has been taken down.” The statement came hours after White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt described as “fake outrage” a wave of negative reactions to the video, including from several prominent Republican lawmakers. Leavitt also said it was “from an internet meme video depicting President Trump as the King of the Jungle and Democrats as characters from the Lion King.” Trump’s clip included a song from that musical.
