Professor Laurence Tribe has generally been quick to criticize Donald Trump‘s words and actions. After last night, though, the Harvard Law professor will probably take a little more time to examine his sources before railing against the President. Just after 11:00 pm on Wednesday, Tribe retweeted a post that said, “Congrats to Ivanka for securing China trademarks! BIG PROFITS! I don’t know how she is so successful w/ the Chinese!”
The original post, which included a link to a Guardian article about Ivanka Trump getting approval for Chinese trademarks for her brand, was tweeted from an account bearing the name Donald J. Trump and Trump’s picture. But a quick glance at the user’s Twitter handle makes it clear that it didn’t come from either of Trump’s Twitter accounts, but from user @RealDonaldTrFan.
Trump celebrates daughter’s receipt of forbidden Foreign Emoluments. Good going! https://t.co/xL7coAKcOu
— Laurence Tribe (@tribelaw) April 20, 2017
That account doesn’t even pretend to be the real thing, despite using Trump’s name and the same picture as Trump’s personal Twitter account. The profile for @RealDonaldTrFan says, “45th President Donald Trump parody.” Perhaps due to the late hour, Tribe assumed the tweet was legit, and publicly chided the President for supposedly encouraging what Tribe considers to be an illegal, or at least questionable, conflict of interest.
Trump celebrates daughter’s receipt of forbidden Foreign Emoluments. Good going! https://t.co/xL7coAKcOu
— Laurence Tribe (@tribelaw) April 20, 2017
But not long after (yet long enough for other Twitter users to call out the error), Tribe owned up to his mistake. Instead of deleting the tweet and pretending it didn’t happen, Tribe acknowledged the error, and managed to turn it into another jab at Trump, basically saying he’s just as genuine as his parody.
Oops! Looks like this was a fake Trump account, and I fell for it. But @realDonaldTrump is fake too, so I won’t lose sleep over this. https://t.co/sCQtdSQKxj
— Laurence Tribe (@tribelaw) April 20, 2017
