Trump's post of GIF on Clinton adds to his history of controversial retweets

The president has been known to retweet questionable Twitter users.

ByABC News
September 18, 2017, 2:59 PM

— -- President Donald Trump has added another GIF to his history of controversial retweets.

The president on Sunday morning retweeted a fake GIF that shows him hitting a golf ball that slams Hillary Clinton in the back, knocking her down.

The tweet was captioned "Donald Trump's amazing golf swing #CrookedHillary" and was originally posted by a user who lists their name as "CNN SUCKS" and uses the handle @Fuctupmind.

The White House did not immediately respond to ABC News’ request for comment about the GIF retweet.

This is not the first time that the president's sharing of a GIF with his 38.6 million Twitter followers has raised eyebrows.

In July, Trump retweeted a video mockup showing the president body-slamming a person whose head was a CNN logo.

The GIF was apparently created from a real video clip of a 2007 stunt in which the then-real estate mogul body-slammed and repeatedly punch World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) Chairman Vince McMahon.

A Reddit user at the time, with the handle Han------Solo, claimed to have posted the original mockup of Trump body-slamming the CNN logo. The Anti-Defamation League published an analysis of that user's Reddit history which found a number of posts that the organization said expressed hate against African-Americans, Muslims and Jews.

The White House said the GIF the president retweeted of him body-slamming the CNN logo didn't come from Reddit but did not disclose where the image had originated.

The president's retweet Sunday of the GIF of him hitting a golf ball at Clinton was one of about eight retweets that he shared over the weekend.

Trump retweeted one user, who lists the name "Trumpism 9.0TM" and the handle @Team_Trump45, four times. Each of those tweets had a photo, including one of a train with a "Make America Great Again" hat and another of a cartoon of Trump appearing to drag industries, such as coal and car manufacturing, and individual companies, such as Carrier, Nabisco and Apple, presumably back to the U.S. from overseas.

It is hard to identify some of the Twitter users whom Trump retweets. The user who tweeted the GIF of Trump’s golf shot hitting Clinton, for example, has listed as an account name "CNN SUCKS," and as a handle @Fuctupmind. The account’s bio is a series of hashtags like #Trump, #LockHerUp and #IStandWithHannity.

Similarly, the user Trumpism 9.0 uses as a profile image a photo of actor Mark Wahlberg in what looks like a military helmet, and the Twitter bio says only, "Trumpism epitomizes Conservatism, Capitalism, patriotism, & respect for the Constitution. #MAGA," with a link to a cancer treatment fundraising page, though it is unclear how the user may be associated with the fundraising effort.

Another Twitter user whom Trump retweeted twice over the weekend goes by the name "Lana del Fenty," which appears to reference both singers Lana del Ray and Rihanna. The profile picture is of model Kendall Jenner with a dog image filter from Snapchat.

The Twitter users retweeted by Trump have come under scrutiny before he was elected too. In January 2016, candidate Trump retweeted a post about his then-rival for the GOP nomination, Jeb Bush, by a user with the handle "WhiteGenocideTM." That account has since been suspended by Twitter.

Some accounts whose posts Trump has retweeted have posted anti-Semitic tweets in the past. Buzzfeed highlighted tweets in which @Fuctupmind, for example, blasted Hasidic Jews.

Trump does not follow any of the aforementioned Twitter users himself, but one way that he may have spotted the tweets he chose to retweet this past weekend is that the original posts tagged the president's handle. The president would be able to see all tweets that tag his handle in his Twitter notifications.

Trump only directly follows 45 accounts, among them relatives, businesses, members of his administration, Fox News accounts and personalities, and television producer Mark Burnett who helped create "The Apprentice."

Related Topics