Gavin Newsom made some changes to the TIME magazine cover of Donald Trump that upset the president. He fixed what some people might find very unattractive: Trump’s neck.
On Tuesday afternoon, the Governor Newsom Press Office shared an edited version of the TIME cover with Trump’s neck blurred out.
The loose skin on Trump’s neck has been a topic of jokes online, with many commenters making memes that compare the neck to genitalia.
This came after a small controversy caused by Trump’s dissatisfaction with the TIME cover photo.
On Monday, TIME magazine published a story that praised Trump, 79, for his role in a peace plan in the Israel/Hamas conflict with the help of his son-in-law, Jared Kushner and Special Envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff.
The cover photo shows Trump standing in front of the sun from a low angle.
In a late-night rant on Truth Social, Trump called the picture the “Worst of All Time” and said he was upset that the cover image made his hair seem gone.
He also mentioned seeing “something floating on top of my head that looked like a floating crown, but an extremely small one.”
The photo so annoyed the president that his supporters rushed to X to create more flattering versions of the cover.
For example, Kari Lake, the acting CEO of the U.S. Agency for Global Media, posted a photo that made Trump look skinnier and less wrinkled. She asked her followers to share the image.
Like many media outlets, TIME has long been a target of Trump’s frustrations.
The magazine has featured many unflattering photos of Trump in the past, including drawings of Trump melting and Trump looking threatening at a crying toddler.
TIME even had to step in to get Trump to remove a fake cover from March 1, 2009, with the headline “TRUMP IS HITTING ON ALL FRONTS… EVEN TV!”
In 2017, the Washington Post reported that the fake cover was framed and hung in at least five of Trump’s golf clubs.
That same year, Trump had a brief tantrum because he wasn’t named the magazine’s Person of the Year (he won the award in 2024).
Newsom’s edit was just one of several actions his X account took against Trump and the administration on Tuesday.
Earlier that day, it also made fun of Eric Trump promoting his book signing at an empty Barnes and Noble.
“The Government is shut down, people are getting laid off, health care is becoming more expensive and the ‘ruling’ family is out promoting their next grift,” the account wrote.
Before that, the account added a beard to a piece of ham as a joke about the troubled border czar, Tom Homan.
In addition to teasing Trump, Newsom, 58, gained an important ally in one of his key initiatives on Tuesday.
Former President Barack Obama supported California’s Prop 50, an initiative that would create more blue districts in California, helping to fight against red state gerrymandering efforts to pack more Republicans into Congress.
About the Author
