{"id":199704,"date":"2026-02-08T23:07:01","date_gmt":"2026-02-08T23:07:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/obamas-silent-on-racist-trump-ape-post-cheer-on-us-olympic-team-usa-today\/"},"modified":"2026-02-08T23:07:01","modified_gmt":"2026-02-08T23:07:01","slug":"obamas-silent-on-racist-trump-ape-post-cheer-on-us-olympic-team-usa-today","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/obamas-silent-on-racist-trump-ape-post-cheer-on-us-olympic-team-usa-today\/","title":{"rendered":"Obamas, silent on racist Trump ape post, cheer on US Olympic team – USA Today"},"content":{"rendered":"

Barack<\/a> and Michelle Obama<\/a> haven\u2019t responded to President Donald Trump<\/a>\u2019s social media post that included a portion portraying them as apes in the jungle<\/a>.
But on Feb. 6, they posted a shared message of encouragement for American athletes competing at the 2026 Winter Olympics just underway in Italy.
\u201cTo all the athletes representing @TeamUSA<\/a>: I\u2019m so proud of you,\u201d Obama wrote on X<\/a> about the 2026 Winter Olympics<\/a>. \u201cYour talent and perseverance have brought you to this moment, and Michelle and I will be joining Americans from across the country cheering you on.\u201d
The post was seen by 41 million people as of Saturday morning.
The Obamas have rarely responded to Trump\u2019s provocations, dating back to when the real estate mogul first gained headlines as a dark horse political candidate with \u201cbirther\u201d falsehoods suggesting Obama was not a native-born U.S. citizen but was actually from Africa.
But given the near-global condemnation of Trump for his latest post, the Obamas\u2019 congratulatory message for the athletes was seen as something of a response by their many supporters.
\u201cShow us you’re unbothered without telling us you’re unbothered. … #Respect<\/a> #ARealPresident<\/a>,\u201d the NAACP posted on X<\/a>.
\u201cToday I GOTTA give some love to the FIRST Black President of America @POTUS44 @BarackObama<\/a> and @FLOTUS44<\/a> @MichelleObama<\/a> true class and excellence personified,\u201d Eldridge Recasner, a former NBA guard and TV basketball analyst, posted on X under the message #BlackHistoryMonth<\/a>, which started at the beginning of February. \u201cGuess some have a right to be jealous of them as they set the Bar HIGH at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.\u201d
The video, among dozens of posts on Trump\u2019s Truth Social account in the late hours of Feb. 5 and early hours of Feb. 6, provoked\u00a0a firestorm of criticism<\/a>, and conflicting accounts from the White House as to exactly how the racist trope was retweeted by the president\u2019s account.
The White House initially dismissed criticism<\/a> that the Obama video was racist and said it is from a meme depicting Trump and the Obamas as characters from the movie \u201cThe Lion King.\u201d But the post was removed after about 12 hours and a White House official later told USA TODAY a staffer erroneously posted it.
The brief portion of the video with the Obamas appears to have been created by artificial intelligence. It depicts the bodies of two apes with the faces of the former president and first lady. Apes are flying around in the background of what appears to be a jungle.
Critics, including Republican lawmakers, have roundly condemned Trump for the post.
Sen. Tim Scott, a close Trump ally and prominent Black Republican from South Carolina who is leading the Senate\u2019s campaign efforts this year, wrote he was \u201cpraying it was fake because it\u2019s the most racist thing I\u2019ve seen out of this White House.\u201d
But Trump has refused to apologize<\/a> for the post, saying he didn\u2019t view the entire video before passing it along to staff.
“I look at a lot of, thousands, of things,” Trump\u00a0told reporters<\/a>\u00a0while traveling on Air Force One to Florida on Feb. 6. “And I looked at the beginning of it, it was fine.”
Asked about calls from GOP lawmakers for him to apologize, Trump said he didn’t plan to. He later said “of course I do” when asked if he condemned the racist part of the video.
But, Trump said, \u201cI didn’t make a mistake.”
Initially, an Obama spokeswoman said the former president had no response. The Obama Foundation later posted a video compilation of the Obamas talking about their love for each other and shared values.
It’s part of a pattern of conduct for the couple that’s perhaps best defined by Michelle Obama’s oft-quoted convention speech during the 2016 election as former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton campaigned against Trump. \u201cWhen they go low<\/a>,” she said to thunderous applause, “we go high.\u201d
She has since said that the phrase doesn’t mean doing nothing: \u201cIt\u2019s about making your work count and your voice heard in a way that\u2019s authentic to you and constructive for others.\u201d
NAACP President Derrick Johnson called the video \u201cutterly despicable\u201d and said in a statement that Trump was trying to distract the public from bad polls, economic conditions and the\u00a0latest release of Justice Department files on disgraced late financer and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein<\/a>.
\u201cYou know who isn\u2019t in the Epstein files? Barack Obama,\u201d he said. \u201cYou know who actually improved the economy as president? Barack Obama.\u201d
\u201cEvery elected official, every corporation, every organization, if you are silent now, if you are not condemning the behavior of the President of the United States, history will remember,\u201d Johnson said in an X post<\/a>. \u201cAnd I assure, our community will remember as well.<\/p>\n

source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Barack and Michelle Obama haven\u2019t responded to President Donald Trump\u2019s social media post that included a portion portraying them as apes in the jungle.But on Feb. 6, they posted a shared message of encouragement for American athletes competing at the 2026 Winter Olympics just underway in Italy.\u201cTo all the athletes representing @TeamUSA: I\u2019m so proud […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":199705,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-199704","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-us","8":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/199704","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=199704"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/199704\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/199705"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=199704"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=199704"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=199704"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}