The White House managed to share a spectacular self-own as they attempted to take aim at Canada in a post on social media.
The last few days have seen US-Canadian relations deteriorate once more after Donald Trump reignited a trade war between the North American neighbours.
The US has said it will apply a 50% levy on nearly $20bn (C$28bn; £14bn) of Canadian imports after trade talks between teh two sides collapsed last week.
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In response, Canada has said it will match the US levies dollar for dollar, with prime minister Mark Carney keen to forge closer ties with the EU.
Of course, Trump and his administration have demonstrated their complete lack of understanding about international trade by claiming that they were ending Canada’s “free ride” with the tariffs.
In a lengthy post shared on X, the official White House account said that Canada had been “ripping off the United States for decades — and President Donald J. Trump is done letting them get away with it.”
The White House then reposted the article with a picture of a bald eagle on top of a Canada goose, a picture they no doubt believed provided the perfect metaphor for their relationship with Canada.
Except, this isn’t quite the case.
It has been pointed out by many online that the picture is actually footage from a fight between the two birds – that the goose ends up winning.
The avian scrap was captured on camera in February last year by wildlife photographer Mervyn Sequeira. Speaking to Canadian news channel CBC News, he said the fight was like a boxing match but that in the end the goose “survived the day” as the eagle flew off.
Reacting to the White House’s self-own on X, one person wrote: “Someone just pointed out that—almost unbelievably—this is real footage from a fight in which the Canada goose ultimately prevailed over the eagle.
“If this isn’t a metaphor for US trade policy, I don’t know what is.”
Several others responded to the White House’s post pointing out the same thing.