White House Denies Syria Strike Photo Was Misleading

White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders tweeted a photo Saturday that appeared to show President Trump directing missile strikes from the Situation Room on Friday, but sharp-eyed observers noticed something unusual: The caption read "Last night the President put our adversaries on notice," but Vice President Mike Pence was in the photo, even though he was in Peru when the attack took place. "Fascinating tweet in which Sarah Sanders reveals that Mike Pence was simultaneously in Peru and Washington," said former Office of Government Ethics chief Walter Shaub, per the Guardian. "If this new capability doesn’t scare our enemies, nothing will."

Sanders clarified Sunday that the photo had not been taken Friday night. "I said, the President put our adversaries on notice that he enforces red lines with the strike on Syria Friday night," she tweeted. "The photo was taken Thursday in the Situation Room during Syria briefing." She tells Politico—which notes that the photo was reminiscent of the image of Barack Obama, Joe Biden, and other senior officials during the 2011 raid that killed Osama bin Laden—that the Situation Room photo was "not misleading at all." (More White House stories.)