Trump ignites new racism row with doctored Obama Air Force One graffiti image

President Donald Trump has sparked fresh controversy after sharing a doctored image of Barack and Michelle Obama waving from an Air Force One aircraft defaced with graffiti.

The post, made on Sunday, follows a pattern of incendiary rhetoric and comes months after another widely condemned image depicting the couple as primates.

The falsified picture shows the Obamas smiling at the top of the presidential plane’s stairs, which has been spray-painted with slogans including the Democrat’s campaign motto "Yes We Can," "Obama," and "BLM," an abbreviation for Black Lives Matter. Arabic script, reading "alhamdulillah" – meaning "praise be to God" or "thank God" – is also visible.

The use of graffiti in such contexts is often a coded message, historically employed in racist messaging against Black individuals to evoke crime and urban decay.

Mr Trump has a long history of intensely personal criticism directed at the Obamas, frequently employing inflammatory and at times racist language. This includes promoting the false claim that Barack Obama was not born in the United States, making crude generalisations about majority-Black nations, and sharing provocative content on his Truth Social platform.

The previous racist post, showing the Obamas as primates, appeared in February during Black History Month and was removed following widespread condemnation from civil rights leaders and Republican senators. Mr Trump, however, refused to apologise, with a staff member later taking the blame.

The timing of the Air Force One image is particularly sensitive, given that Mr Trump recently took his inaugural flight on a new presidential aircraft – a retrofitted Boeing 747-800, valued at $400m and gifted by Qatar. The plane’s traditional light blue hull, designed to blend with the sky, has been replaced with Mr Trump’s preferred navy-blue, red, and gold colour scheme.

On Sunday, after delivering a speech on the National Mall in Washington to commemorate Independence Day, Mr Trump had no public engagements and spent the day at his golf club in Virginia. He is scheduled to depart for Turkey on Monday to attend a summit with NATO allies. Neither the White House nor a spokeswoman for the Obamas immediately responded to requests for comment.

This latest incident follows another doctored image shared by Mr Trump last month, which depicted Barack Obama’s new presidential library in Chicago appearing as if it had a large bag of rubbish on its roof and was surrounded by a wasteland.

AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein

At the time, Mr Trump wrote: "The Obama Library ten years from now will be a ‘Mecca’ for those who hate America! President DJT." He posted the image twice on his social media platform.

The Air Force One image was part of a series of Sunday posts on Truth Social, which also included an old photograph seemingly showing Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni grinning and looking up at Mr Trump, accompanied by the words "RESTRAINING ORDER NEEDED."

This particular post could ignite further diplomatic tensions at this week’s meetings in Turkey, especially after Mr Trump previously suggested Ms Meloni had "over and over" asked for a photo with him during the recent Group of Seven summit, implying she had begged for the picture. Ms Meloni vehemently denied this, stating her account was "completely fabricated" and that "Italy and I never beg," leading Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani to cancel a planned trip to Washington.