During Tuesday's Turning Point USA's teen summit in Washington, President Donald Trump stepped out onto the stage in front of an image of the official seal of the president, according to a story originally in The Washington Post.
Except it wasn't the official seal, which is an eagle holding arrows in its left talons and an olive branch in its right claw.
On Thursday morning, the conservative group Turning Point USA announced it had fired the member of its video team responsible for displaying the fake seal.
“We did let the individual go,” a Turning Point spokesman told The Washington Post. "I don’t think it was malicious intent, but nevertheless.”
The spokesman called the mistake “unacceptable” and said it was the result of a rushed online search to find a second image of the presidential seal to display behind Trump.
The man who created the seal is Charles Leazott, a 46-year-old graphic designer. He tells the Washington Post he created it in 2016 after the election as a partial joke and as a jab against Trump. Leazott tells the Post he's a lifelong Republican but has turned against the party since Trump was elected.
He explains that he replaced the golf clubs for the arrows in the eagle's claws as a shout out to the president's favorite hobby and the money for the olive branch in the eagle's other claw. Additionally, he swapped the Latin motto for a Spanish insult (translated as 45 is a puppet) and gave the eagle two heads to represent the imperial bird from the Russian coat of arms, an homage to Trump's tight relationship with Putin and Russia.
Leazott says he believes whoever put the seal up behind the president didn't do it accidentally, but intentionally.
He was uncovered as the creator of the seal when his online marketplace was discovered.
“That’s a load of crap,” he told the Post in response to Turning Point’s explanation. “You have to look for this. There’s no way this was an accident is all I’m saying.”
Despite the vast number of insults he's endured on social media since his name became public, Leazott says he was thrilled to see Trump standing in front of the fake seal. He says the person who put it up was “either wildly incompetent or the best troll ever — either way, I love them.”