WASHINGTON—Vice President J.D. Vance on Tuesday urged Americans to relax after President Trump briefly posted an AI-generated image of himself radiating divine light, clarifying that the post was “clearly a joke,” and not, as several million people concluded, the soft launch of a new branch of Christianity called Executive Orderism.
“Look, the President likes to mix it up,” Vance told reporters, standing in front of a podium that briefly flickered with a halo-shaped lens flare. “Sometimes that means policy. Sometimes that means trade. And sometimes that means posting what appears to be a Renaissance painting of himself healing the sick.”
The image—featuring Trump in flowing robes, hands aglow, and what experts later identified as “aggressively Photoshopped serenity”—was deleted shortly after conservative leaders expressed concern that the post may have crossed a line between political messaging and, quote, “starting a side hustle as the Messiah.”
Vance, who converted to Catholicism in 2019, emphasized that misunderstandings like this are common when dealing with a president who is “not filtered,” adding that Americans should learn to distinguish between literal divinity and “high-level social media trolling that just happens to look exactly like a stained-glass window.”
Sources inside the White House confirmed that the President initially believed the image depicted him “as a doctor,” explaining that the glowing hands were “probably something to do with the Red Cross” and that any resemblance to Jesus Christ was “media spin, very unfair to doctors, frankly.”
At press time, administration officials were scrambling to clarify that a follow-up post showing Trump parting a crowd at Mar-a-Lago was “metaphorical,” and not, as several aides had feared, a beta test for walking on water at Bedminster.