Report Claims Pro-Trump Account Who Called Racist Obama Video a 'Masterpiece' May Be Operated by White House Staffer

A White House rapid response manager has been identified by WIRED as the alleged operator of @johnnymaga, an anonymous pro-Trump X account with nearly 380,000 followers that called a racist AI-generated video depicting Barack and Michelle Obama as apes a 'masterpiece.'

WIRED published its investigation on 25 February 2026, identifying Garrett Wade, 27, as the person allegedly running the @johnnymaga account. The account has never disclosed its ties to the White House, and Wade went to significant lengths to avoid any traceable public online presence; a deliberate anonymity that, WIRED's reporters allege, has allowed mainstream outlets to cite the account as evidence of organic grassroots support for the president.

The 'Masterpiece' Post and the Racist Video That Started It

On the night of 5 February 2026, Trump's Truth Social account published a video focused on 2020 election conspiracy theories. At its end, without warning or context, the Obamas' faces appeared superimposed on cartoon apes as 'The Lion Sleeps Tonight' by The Tokens played over the footage.

The post was one of dozens Trump shared that night. South Carolina Senator Tim Scott, the only Black Republican in the chamber, called it 'the most racist thing I've seen out of this White House.'

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt initially defended the post on the morning of 6 February, describing it as 'an internet meme video depicting President Trump as the King of the Jungle and Democrats as characters from the Lion King.' She urged journalists to 'stop the fake outrage.' Hours later, the White House reversed course.

An official told NBC News: 'A White House staffer erroneously made the post. It has been taken down.' The administration never publicly named that staffer.

That same day, Trump spoke to reporters aboard Air Force One. He said he had only watched the beginning of the video before handing it off to staff for posting. 'No, I didn't make a mistake,' he told reporters. 'I looked at the beginning of it. It was fine.' He said he condemned the racist portion of the video but would not apologise.

The @johnnymaga account posted in apparent support of that explanation, writing: 'The most obvious tell that Trump's Truth Social post wasn't intentional is that he would've posted the entire thing if he had seen it. It's a masterpiece.'

Who Is Garrett Wade — and How Did WIRED Identify Him?

According to the WIRED investigation, the link between Wade and the @johnnymaga account begins with a phone number. The number associated with Wade, through public records and Federal Election Commission (FEC) donation filings, is the same number linked to the @johnnymaga account.

The account also previously operated under a different handle that incorporated Wade's birth year. WIRED reported that a source close to the White House subsequently confirmed the connection.

Wade grew up in Newtown, Pennsylvania, and attended community college in Bucks County. FEC records show that between 2023 and 2024, he made donations through WinRed listing his employer first as 'tech school' and later as Opinion Architects, a digital consultancy group whose address geolocates to the same Bucks County area as the phone number tied to the @johnnymaga account.

According to White House ethics records reviewed by WIRED, Opinion Architects is owned by Taylor Budowich, who served as assistant to the president and deputy chief of staff for communications until September 2025. Make America Great Again Inc., the pro-Trump super PAC of which Budowich was also executive director, paid Opinion Architects more than £257,000 ($325,000) for 'research' and 'communications' consulting.

Wade is married to Allison Schuster, 26, who works at the White House as a press assistant. Before her Instagram account was set to private, it showed the couple attending Trump-aligned events together wearing MAGA hats. Schuster has reportedly reposted dozens of tweets from the @johnnymaga account, including one that praised her own boss, press secretary Karoline Leavitt. Neither Wade, Schuster, nor the White House responded to The Daily Beast's requests for comment ahead of publication.

Astroturfing, the Hatch Act, and a White House Pattern

The core concern raised by the investigation is not simply that a government employee ran a political meme account. It is that the @johnnymaga account was cited by multiple mainstream outlets, including Mother Jones, TownHall, and the New York Post, as evidence of organic public sentiment in favour of the president.

That framing collapses entirely if the person behind the account was simultaneously drawing a government salary to manage Trump's official rapid response messaging.

Wade is not an isolated case. WIRED notes that the Department of Defence employs at least two former creators on its digital media team who continue to run outside accounts. Graham Allen, a right-wing podcaster, was hired as the Pentagon's director of digital media while continuing to host his podcast 'Dear America.'

Amjed Yacu operates the @snowflake.tears Instagram meme page, which has more than 330,000 followers, while on the Pentagon's payroll. Yacu discloses his government role on the meme account. Wade, according to WIRED, did not.

Federal workers are prohibited from engaging in overtly partisan political activity under the Hatch Act, which restricts the use of official authority to influence an election and bars certain political activity from employees in sensitive positions. The law carries no mandated investigative triggers, however, and enforcement has historically been inconsistent.

Watchdog groups and Democratic lawmakers filed separate Hatch Act complaints against Trump administration officials last year. None resulted in disciplinary action that has been made public.

Former Vice President Kamala Harris condemned the White House's 'rogue staffer' explanation for the original racist post as a cover-up. 'No one believes this from the White House, especially since they originally defended the post,' she wrote on X.

The Obama Foundation, for its part, did not address the staffer story directly, but shared a montage of Barack and Michelle Obama's love story on social media in the days following the controversy.

If the allegation holds, it means the same White House staffer who may have helped shape the administration's official response to a racist post was simultaneously, and secretly, calling that post a masterpiece.