The Latest Cover Of 'Time' Has The Internet Roasting Donald Trump
President Donald Trump is on the cover of TIME magazine again. It's the fourth cover in a series depicting the turmoil surrounding his presidency, but it's not like the others. This time, he's shown walking outside, singing in the rain with a big smile on his face. It's probably as wild as it sounds, and it gets weirder when you take into account what he's celebrating. Just check Twitter — people are roasting TF out of Donald Trump's 2019 TIME cover.
The cover, first posted to Instagram on March 28, shows the president escaping a storm in the political world. It features headlines such as "The Trump Reboot" and "Barr's Next Move," in reference to the conclusion of Special Counsel Robert Mueller's probe, which reportedly found no evidence of collusion between Trump's 2016 campaign and Russia. The findings were summarized in a public letter U.S. Attorney General William Barr sent to Congress on March 24, but not everyone is satisfied with that, and many have called on him to release the full report to the public. As of this writing, Barr has yet to do so. Elite Daily previously reached out to the Department of Justice for comment on whether Barr will release the report, but did not hear back.
The cover is the fourth installment in a series by artist Tim O’Brien featuring allegories of the president and bad weather. The first two showed Trump amid gathering rain clouds in the Oval Office, and were labeled "Nothing to see here" and "Stormy" respectively. The third one, titled "In Deep," pretty much showed the president drowning in office amid the legal troubles of his former associates. But the latest one is a change. "America has now seen Trump weather a massive investigation led by a widely respected prosecutor," TIME journalist Brian Bennett wrote in the cover story. "Somehow, Trump turned what might have been a catastrophe to any other President — a sweeping inquiry into potential collusion with a foreign power to undermine U.S. democracy — into a rebuttal against whatever comes next."
As expected, people had a lot to say. Some people joked the art was unrealistic, as Trump has had trouble opening umbrellas in the past. Others criticized the publication for featuring the president before the full Mueller report has been released. Elite Daily reached out to TIME for comment on the criticism but did not immediately hear back. The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment regarding the cover and the jokes.
"Seems a little premature, @TIME. Nobody has seen even seen the Mueller report yet," one person tweeted.
"This ain’t it, Chief," another person said.
Then there were, of course, people who saw the cover and couldn't help but think of that time Trump hogged an umbrella and left Melania out in the rain.
"For accuracy Melania should be behind him out in the rain," a Twitter user mused.
Man, that's awkward.
While Democrats have been calling on Barr to release the full report by April 2 in hopes of determining any possible wrongdoing by the president, Trump has been on a victory lap. In a March 27 interview with Fox News, Trump bragged about the outcome of the Mueller report, saying, per Newsweek, that he "was the most innocent human being." And the same day that Barr shared a summary of Mueller's findings, the president tweeted, "No Collusion, No Obstruction, Complete and Total EXONERATION. KEEP AMERICA GREAT!"
However, it's worth pointing out that Mueller did not clear Trump of obstruction, and in fact expressly wrote that the report "does not exonerate" the president. In his summary, Barr quoted the report's lack of exoneration, but concluded along with Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein "that the evidence developed during the Special Counsel’s investigation is not sufficient to establish that the President committed an obstruction-of-justice offense." Elite Daily previously reached out to the White House for comment on or clarification of this tweet, but did not hear back.
He's basically been as happy as the TIME cover has painted him out to be, so maybe that's where they were going with that.
