The White House's Official Newsletter Accidentally Highlighted an Article Making Fun of Its Policies

Maybe read past the headline next time?

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President Donald Trump
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The White House's newsletter, 1600 Daily, sends out details about President Trump's schedule, updates about policies and special guests, and news articles about the president. What it usually doesn't include is satirical articles that blatantly make fun of the POTUS. But on Friday, presumably by accident, it did just that.

At the very end of the newsletter, 1600 Daily linked to a Washington Post article called "Trump's budget makes perfect sense and will fix America, and I will tell you why." The only problem? It was satire, written by humor columnist Alexandra Petri.

Text, Font, Screenshot,

(Image credit: Archives)

If you actually took the time to read the column, you would know instantly it was a joke. Here's a brief excerpt:

"This budget will make America a lean, mean fighting machine with bulging, rippling muscles and not an ounce of fat. America has been weak and soft for too long. BUT HOW WILL I SURVIVE ON THIS BUDGET? you may be wondering. I AM A HUMAN CHILD, NOT A COSTLY FIGHTER JET. You may not survive, but that is because you are SOFT and WEAK, something this budget is designed to eliminate."

And one more for good measure:

"All schoolchildren will be taught by an F-35 wearing a Make America Great Again hat. They will also have new school choice options including the choice not to afford any school at all, because at school you are taught things like grammar and pronouns and spelling and history, and these are all potentially inimical to the future we are trying to build. We will also be cutting Meals on Wheels programs to feed children, because they are not improving performance as we would like. Feed children just to feed them? What are we, SOFT? No. No we are not."

The article is still linked on the White House's website, and so far there has been no comment about the mixup. Petri, for her part, both tweeted that her story was "real news" and "best news" and also lamented that nobody bothers to actually read things these days. And in a column, she responded, joking that, "I agree that my articles are much worse if you click on them."

Update: As of 4 p.m. Friday, the article has been deleted from the online version of the newsletter.

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Megan Friedman
Megan Friedman
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Megan Friedman is the former managing editor of the Newsroom at Hearst. She's worked at NBC and Time, and is a graduate of Northwestern's Medill School of Journalism.