Culture

Hey, At Least Your Day Isn’t As Bad As This News Editor Who Confused Alec Baldwin For Trump

#FakeNews

by Meg Watson  13 February 2017

Want more Junkee in your life? Sign up to our newsletter, and follow us on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook so you always know where to find us.

Happy Monday, guys! Did you have a big weekend? Feeling stressed or tired or just a bit shit? At least you’re not an accomplished media professional getting internationally shamed for confusing the President of the United States with a comedian pouting his lips and wearing with half a kilo of dirty cat fur on his head!

On Friday, Dominican broadsheet El Nacional published a photo of Alec Baldwin on its front page alongside one of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The story was about Israeli settlements and thus pretty unlikely to reference the Saturday Night Live comedian, but unfortunately no one picked that up before it went to print.

Though the incident could be claimed as a Trump/Spicer-grade attempt at negging the President, the paper has now issued a formal apology over the incident. It’s about as cringeworthy as you’d expect, even accounting for the direct translation from Spanish.

“El Nacional published on Friday as Donald Trump a picture of actor Alec Baldwin, who imitates on a television program the president of the United States,” the statement read. “The picture was sent that day by Associated Press (AP) with the name of the actor and reported on the program, but was placed as if it were Trump’s — a situation that went unnoticed for all who reviewed page 19.

“El Nacional apologises to the readers and to all those who felt affected by the publication. Actor Baldwin imitates President Trump on the Saturday Night Live weekly show on the National Broadcasting Company (NBC), one of the most important in the United States.”

In other news (and this is a Junkee exclusive), it looks like the president got a sick tan last night: