Trump refuses to apologise for racist social media post featuring the Obamas

U.S. President Donald Trump says he will not apologise for a racist social media post on his Truth Social account featuring former President Barack Obama and his wife Michelle Obama as monkeys in a jungle. The post was deleted Friday after a backlash from both Republicans and Democrats who criticised the video, calling it offensive.

U.S. President Donald Trump refused to apologise for posting a racist video of the Obamas on his social media account. "No, I didn't make a mistake. I mean, if I look at a lot of thousands of things, and I looked at the beginning of it, it was fine. They had that one post, and I guess it was a takeoff - by the way, a lot people covered. If you look at where it came from, a lot of, I guess, it's a takeoff on the Lion King."

Nearly all of the 62-second video posted by Trump appears to be a repost from a conservative social media influencer who used AI to create the images. The post has since been deleted.

Criticism of the video came from both sides of the aisle, with Democratic representative for Texas Al Green saying Trumps actions condone racism.

"What the President has done is gone beyond racial profiling; this is racism. This is raw, rank racism. When the president of the United States of America who knows or should know the history of this country and how persons have used this image of persons of African ancestry to be associated with persons who are members of the monkey family. For the president to do this, and to do it openly and notoriously, is showing that he condones this level of racism."

The White House blamed a staffer for posting the video erroneously.

The post was part of a flurry of social media activity on Trump's Truth Social account that amplified his unproven claim that the 2020 election was stolen from him, despite courts around the country and a Trump attorney general from his first term finding no evidence of fraud that could have affected the outcome.