Trump deletes ‘racist’ post after wave of Republican backlash, White House says he didn’t know

President Donald Trump took down an inflammatory post from Truth Social that depicted the Obamas as monkeys after a wave of backlash from some of the president’s top allies on Capitol Hill. 

The post first appeared on Thursday night and went under the radar until Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., the lone Black member of the Senate GOP, demanded Trump take it down.

The post in question depicted former President Barack Obama and former first lady Michelle Obama as monkeys or apes.

‘Praying it was fake because it’s the most racist thing I’ve seen out of this White House,’ Scott said. ‘The President should remove it.’

His reaction opened a floodgate of responses from other congressional Republicans, who didn’t buy the White House’s initial explanation for the video. 

‘This is totally unacceptable,’ Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., said on X. ‘The president should take it down and apologize.’ 

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt wrote the post off as a ‘meme’ that was part of a video depicting Trump as the king of the jungle from ‘The Lion King.’ 

‘Even if this was a Lion King meme, a reasonable person sees the racist context to this,’ Sen. Pete Ricketts, R-Neb., said in a post on X. ‘The White House should do what anyone does when they make a mistake: remove this and apologize.’

Still, it took several hours for the post to be removed. 

A Trump advisor told Fox News Digital that ‘the president did not see the video before it was posted.’

Sen. Katie Britt, R-Ala., said on X, ‘This content was rightfully removed, should have never been posted to begin with, and is not who we are as a nation.’

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., similarly called on Trump to take the post down. 

‘Racist. Vile. Abhorrent. This is dangerous and degrades our country — where are Senate Republicans? The President must immediately delete the post and apologize to Barack and Michelle Obama, two great Americans who make Donald Trump look like a small, envious man,’ Schumer said on X. 

The post has since been removed, and a Trump advisor told Fox News Digital that ‘the president did not see the video before it was posted.’

Scott and Trump have shared a warm relationship since he ran and ultimately dropped out of the Republican presidential race last year. 

He now chairs the National Republican Senatorial Committee, the Senate GOP’s campaign arm tasked with keeping Republicans’ thin majority in the upper chamber and expanding it during the 2026 midterm cycle. 

Scott has rarely bucked Trump, positioning himself as a top ally to the president — he was on the short list of possible vice presidential picks before Trump ultimately tapped then Sen. JD Vance, R-Ohio. 

However, he has recently broken with the president on the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) investigation into Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell.

Scott, who also chairs the Senate Banking Committee, said during an interview with Fox Business earlier this week that he didn’t believe Powell had committed a crime during his testimony to the committee last year.

The White House did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.