The now-deleted image showed Trump, wearing a white robe, with a glowing hand on the forehead of a sick man, which critics said was similar to religious paintings showing Jesus healing the infirm. <\/p>\n
The background of the images included the Statue of Liberty, a large US flag fluttering, fighter jets and an eagle, as well as a nurse, a woman praying and what appeared to be a soldier in uniform. <\/p>\n
Speaking to reporters several hours after it was removed, Trump said he believed the image depicted him as a doctor next to a Red Cross worker. <\/p>\n
“It’s supposed to be as a doctor making people better,” he said. “And I do make people better. I make people a lot better.” <\/p>\n
Criticism of the image came swiftly, including from figures considered close to Trump and the administration. <\/p>\n
“This should be deleted immediately,” wrote Sean Feucht, a Christian activist who is working on a series of faith-based events to mark the 250th anniversary of the US Declaration of Independence this year.<\/p>\n
“There’s no context where this is acceptable,” he added. <\/p>\n
Riley Gaines, a prominent conservative activist, wrote that “God shall not be mocked”. <\/p>\n
Much of the criticism also came from faith-based US news outlets. <\/p>\n
“This goes too far. It crosses the line,” wrote David Brody, a journalist with the Christian Broadcasting Network. “A supporter can back the mission and reject this.” <\/p>\n
The controversial image was posted less than an hour after a separate post from the US president in which he criticised the pope, calling him “weak on crime” and “terrible for foreign policy”. <\/p>\n
Pope Leo – the first American Pope – has repeatedly condemned the war in Iran, saying it has led to “absurd and inhuman violence”. <\/p>\n
The pope said on Monday that he has “no fear” of the Trump administration or “speaking out loudly of the message of the Gospel, which is what I believe I am here to do”. <\/p>\n
Speaking to reporters at the White House, Trump did not apologise. <\/p>\n
“Pope Leo said things that are wrong,” he said. “He was very much against what I’m doing with regard to Iran, and you cannot have a nuclear Iran. Pope Leo would not be happy with the end result.” <\/p>\n
The AI-generated image is far from the first time Trump’s Truth Social has led to criticism. <\/p>\n
In February, a racist clip depicting Barack and Michelle Obama as apes was posted to his account and later removed. <\/p>\n
The White House initially defended the clip as an “internet meme video” and told critics to “stop the fake outrage”.<\/p>\n
But after fierce criticsm, including from several Republican senators, the post was removed and a White House official said that a staffer had “erroneously” made the post.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The now-deleted image showed Trump, wearing a white robe, with a glowing hand on the forehead of a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":528959,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[49,50,51,47,52,48],"class_list":{"0":"post-528958","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/528958","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=528958"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/528958\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/528959"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=528958"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=528958"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=528958"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}