Did Trump repost a video showing the Obamas as monkeys?
Executive summary
Donald Trump posted a one-minute video on his Truth Social account that includes a brief AI-altered clip depicting former President Barack Obama and former First Lady Michelle Obama with their faces superimposed on monkeys, an image that appears for roughly one second near the end of the clip and plays against the song "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" [1] [2] [3]. The post recycled a video pushing disproven Dominion Voting Systems conspiracy claims and drew swift condemnation from Democratic officials and commentators [2] [1] [4].
1. What was posted: a Truth Social upload containing racist imagery
Multiple outlets reported that the video was shared on Trump’s Truth Social account late on Feb. 5 and that at the 59–60 second mark an AI-generated image briefly shows the Obamas’ faces on ape bodies, accompanied by “The Lion Sleeps Tonight” [5] [3] [1]. The clip lasts about 62 seconds overall and the monkey imagery appears for approximately one second toward the end of the video, according to The Guardian, AFP and other reporting [1] [4] [2].
2. The clip’s content and broader message: election conspiracy plus the offensive gag
News coverage uniformly notes the same structure: the video otherwise advances disproven claims about Dominion Voting Systems and 2020 vote counts, then inserts the brief racist image near the end as a visual gag, not as the video’s substantive argument [2] [1] [6]. Reporting highlights that the conspiracy material in the post echoes long‑debunked allegations about ballot‑counting firms and election tabulators [2] [6].
3. Sourcing: watermark, origin and linkage to pro‑Trump accounts
Several outlets identify a visible watermark on the monkey clip—@XERIAS_X—a pro‑Trump X account with tens of thousands of followers, and they trace the 62‑second video to a Patriot News Outlet page or similar partisan channels that assembled the election‑fraud montage [7] [3]. Reporting stops short of attributing creation of the monkey imagery to the President personally, instead documenting that Trump shared the video from his platform and that parts of it bore third‑party watermarks [7] [3].
4. Reaction and political context: swift condemnation and the pattern of AI imagery
Prominent Democrats and former officials publicly condemned the post as racist, with California Governor Gavin Newsom’s office calling it “disgusting” and commentators labeling it a new low; outlets note this fits a pattern of Trump sharing hyper‑realistic or AI‑altered visuals targeting critics, including a previously circulated video that depicted Barack Obama being arrested [1] [4] [8]. Coverage also documents the timing — during Black History Month — and notes the racial sensitivity of depicting a Black former president and first lady as apes, an historically charged racist trope cited by multiple sources [5] [9] [8].
5. What the reporting does and does not establish
Available reporting consistently establishes that Trump posted the video to Truth Social and that it contains the brief monkey image with a watermark linking to a pro‑Trump X account; however, the coverage does not provide forensic proof in this batch of sources that Trump created the monkey imagery himself rather than reposting a third‑party clip, and it does not include a direct statement from the White House explaining intent [7] [3]. Journalistic accounts instead document the observable facts—the post, the clip’s content, the watermark and the public responses—while noting the video’s partisan provenance [7] [2].
6. Direct answer
Yes: reporting from multiple outlets confirms that Donald Trump shared (posted) a one‑minute video on his Truth Social account that contains a brief AI‑generated depiction of Barack and Michelle Obama as monkeys near the end of the clip [1] [2] [3]. The footage appears to have been produced or at least watermarked by a pro‑Trump X account and is embedded in a video pushing disproven election‑fraud claims; sources do not conclusively prove whether Trump himself authored the monkey image rather than reposting it, but they do confirm he posted the video on his account [7] [3] [2].