President Trump’s social media account posted a highly controversial video that was quickly deleted. The post included a baseless conspiracy theory about the 2020 election and featured images of former President Barack Obama and former First Lady Michelle Obama placed onto the bodies of apes.
The offensive video immediately drew angry criticism and dominated the news cycle. It even forced some well-known Republicans to speak out against the White House. According to Mediaite, critics from both political parties, media outlets, and political commentators widely condemned the clip as racist.
Senator Tim Scott, the only Black Republican Senator, called the post “the most racist thing I’ve seen out of this White House.” Other Republicans also criticized the post, with Senator Katie Britt saying it was “rightfully removed, should have never been posted to begin with, and is not who we are as a nation.”
The White House tried damage control but one major network stayed silent
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt first tried to defend the post. She dismissed critics as showing “fake outrage” and claimed the post was just sharing an “Internet meme video depicting President Trump as the King of the Jungle.” However, that defense didn’t last long.
By shortly before noon, the post was deleted. The White House quickly blamed an unnamed staffer and called the upload “erroneous.” While terms like “Obama” were trending heavily on social media for hours, showing how big this story was, one major news channel owned by Rupert Murdoch didn’t cover it. This isn’t the first time the administration has faced criticism, as Trump’s recent Greenland tariff strategy drew international concerns.
A review of all programming on that channel and its business counterpart found zero mentions of the controversy all day Friday. It wasn’t mentioned to defend the president, criticize the post, or even report on the widespread reactions.
The silence finally ended on one of the network’s main news programs. The segment lasted just over two minutes and presented the coverage as the White House doing “damage control.” The host noted that the images were being blamed on a staff member and had been removed. World leaders have also struggled with managing their relationships with Trump amid various controversies.
When the network’s senior White House correspondent reported on the issue, he suggested it was “unclear if President Trump ever even saw this image of the Obamas that was tacked onto the end of an unrelated video.”
He added that some of the president’s closest allies had pressured him to take it down, which he did. The correspondent also pointed out that this controversy had totally “upended” the White House’s planned messaging, which was supposed to focus on the TrumpRX.gov program rollout.
Published: Feb 7, 2026 03:15 pm