WASHINGTON (AP) 鈥� President on Sunday posted a falsified image of former and his wife, , waving before boarding an Air Force One that had been spray-painted with graffiti.
It came months after another by the president that showed the couple as primates in a jungle. That one was deleted after stiff, bipartisan backlash.
The latest image shows the Obamas smiling and waving at the top of stairs alongside a baby blue and white presidential plane with graffiti painted on it that included the Democrat’s campaign slogan 鈥淵es We Can,鈥� 鈥淥bama鈥� and 鈥淏LM,鈥� short for Black Lives Matter. The post also shows graffiti in Arabic on the plane that says the phrase 鈥渁lhamdulillah,鈥� which means 鈥減raise be to God鈥� or 鈥渢hank God.”
The use of graffiti is a coded message to remind people of crime and urban decay and has been used in racist messaging against Black people in the past.
Trump has a yearslong record of intensely personal criticism of the Obamas, and of using incendiary, sometimes racist, rhetoric. That includes everything from feeding the lie that Obama was not born in the United States to crude generalizations about majority-Black countries and posts that have sparked anger on his Truth Social website.
The president’s racist post of the Obamas as primates came in February, during the first week of Black History Month. It was removed following widespread criticism from civil rights leaders and Republican senators. Trump refused to apologize, however, and a staffer was later blamed for making the post.
This time, the presidential plane is a sensitive topic since Trump last week took on 鈥� a retrofitted Boeing 747-800 worth $400 million . The aircraft’s trademark light blue hull that helped Air Force One blend into the sky was replaced with Trump鈥檚 preferred color scheme: a navy-blue belly with red and gold stripes.
After on the National Mall in Washington to mark Independence Day and the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence on Saturday night, Trump had no public events on Sunday and spent the day at his golf club in Virginia. He’s set to leave Monday for Turkey to attend a summit with NATO allies.
The White House did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment. Nor did a spokeswoman for the Obamas.
Sunday鈥檚 post also followed one from last month when Trump shared a doctored image of Obama鈥檚 in Chicago, so that it looked like the building had a large bag of garbage on top and was surrounded by a wasteland. 鈥淭he Obama Library ten years from now will be a 鈥楳ecca鈥� for those who hate America! President DJT,鈥� he wrote then.
Trump has frequently criticized the Obama library in public comments, and he posted the library image twice on his social media platform.
The Air Force One image was part of a series of Sunday posts Trump made on Truth Social, including a past picture that appeared to show grinning and gazing upward at Trump under the words 鈥淩ESTRAINING ORDER NEEDED.鈥�
That, too, could touch off a new firestorm at this week’s meetings in Turkey, since Trump had suggested that Meloni asked 鈥渙ver and over鈥� for a photo with him during the recent Group of Seven summit 鈥� and suggesting she begged for such a picture.
Trump’s comments prompted Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani a subsequent, planned trip to Washington, while Meloni called Trump’s account 鈥渃ompletely fabricated,” saying 鈥淚taly and I never beg.”
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