US President Donald Trump has shared a video portraying former president Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle, as monkeys, drawing widespread condemnation and accusations of racism.
Early on Friday, Trump posted the video twice on his Truth Social platform alongside claims of irregularities in the 2020 presidential election, which he lost to Joe Biden.
Biden served as Obama’s vice-president from 2009 to 2017.
Trump defeated Hillary Clinton, the Democratic frontrunner, to win the presidency in 2017 but lost his re-election bid to Biden when he ran for a second term.
In the one-minute clip, Phil Waldron, a cybersecurity expert, alleged that “treachery” occurred during the election, claiming that five key states stopped counting votes simultaneously and used vote-counting machines embedded with election-rigging software.
“When reporting and counting resumed, a massive spike occurred that favoured Joe Biden,” Waldron said.
Barack and Michelle Obama appear only at the end of the video as AI-generated monkey figures dancing to The Lion Sleeps Tonight, a song featured in Disney’s The Lion King animated franchise, most notably performed by Timon and Pumbaa, a meerkat and a warthog.
The post has drawn sharp criticism from political figures and social media users.
“Disgusting behavior by the President. Every single Republican must denounce this. Now,” a statement issued by the press office of California Governor Gavin Newsom reads.
The video has also triggered outrage on social media, with many users accusing the president of racism.