President Donald Trump’s latest late-night social-media meltdown turned into a full-blown White House fiasco. After sharing a video that grotesquely depicts Barack and Michelle Obama as animated apes — a racist trope with a ugly, long history — the administration scrambled to delete it and then pointed fingers at an unnamed staffer for the disaster.
The 60-second clip, which mixed wild conspiracy claims about election machines with that racist imagery set to “The Lion Sleeps Tonight,” went up on Trump’s Truth Social account and immediately exploded online. Outrage was swift and overwhelming, cutting across the usual partisan lines.
Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, initially tried to paper over the debacle with one of the most jaw-dropping defenses of the year, telling reporters the image was merely “from an internet meme video depicting President Trump as the King of the Jungle and Democrats as characters from The Lion King,” and urging critics to bury the story. That didn’t take.
By Friday morning, the post was gone. A senior White House official, speaking anonymously, told CNN White House correspondent Alayna Treene that “a White House staffer erroneously made the post” and that it had been removed — an explanation critics quickly dismissed as spin and a blatant cover-up.
What made the backlash especially painful for Trump’s team was who spoke out. Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.), one of Trump’s closest GOP allies and the only Black Republican in the Senate, blasted the clip on X, calling it possibly “the most racist thing I’ve seen out of this White House” and demanding its removal. That kind of denunciation from a loyalist is rare — and telling.
Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) and Rep. Mike Lawler (R-N.Y.) also publicly condemned the video as unacceptable and offensive, insisting an apology was overdue. Democrats and civil-rights advocates were equally blunt, denouncing the imagery as deeply racist and unacceptable from any public figure — least of all the president.
None of it stopped the initial defense from the administration. Leavitt’s insistence that critics were indulging in “fake outrage” only fueled more anger and skepticism about how seriously the White House was taking the issue.
Online chaos quickly followed. Commenters pointed out that the deleted post remained visible long enough for screenshots and clips to circulate widely, meaning the racist imagery will far outlive the administration’s attempt to bury it. Critics seized on the “staffer” explanation as classic damage control: defend first, then blame someone else when things blow up.
