Someone printed up fake Washington Post newspapers saying Trump resigned

The Washington Post is investigating after getting a number of reports of fake copies of the paper getting passed around downtown DC. The paper also links to a fake Washington Post website:

There are fake print editions of The Washington Post being distributed around downtown DC, and we are aware of a website attempting to mimic The Post’s. They are not Post products, and we are looking into this.

— Washington Post PR (@WashPostPR) January 16, 2019

You can see the issue at wapo-se.com which certainly looks like rather expensive and professionally done satire to us:

Saw a person distributing this actual, printed fake news across the street from the White House/EEOB. They’re definitely not an attempt at parody, so the WaPo could sue. Email for the “reporters” all go to “https://t.co/A46HpCswJ6,” which goes to https://t.co/NuEfaqZBGC website. https://t.co/hlnnxkgr5e

— Andrew Feinberg (@AndrewFeinberg) January 16, 2019

Here’s the cover with a story titled, “UNPRESIDENTED: TRUMP HASTILY DEPARTS WHITE HOUSE, ENDING CRISIS”: “Celebrations break out worldwide as Trump era ends”:

Here’s the fake news in question. pic.twitter.com/zQgyNqWUIZ

— Andrew Feinberg (@AndrewFeinberg) January 16, 2019

From the fake website:

THE CAPITAL — On May 1, barely six months after the midterm elections, Donald Trump appears to have abandoned the White House and abdicated his role as president. He issued no formal statement, though four White House aides — who spoke on the condition of anonymity — claim they found a napkin on the president’s desk in the Oval Office on the evening of April 30, scrawled in red ink with the following message: “Blame Crooked Hillary & Hfior & the Fake News Media.”

WASHINGTON — On Saturday, editors and writers from nearly every major news outlet — including the Washington Post — are slated to gather for a three-day summit in Washington. Called “Journalism Now,” the summit is projected to draw over 4,500 representatives of the news industry. The event was originally slated for June of this year, but the advisory board organizing the event moved up the date in light of the president’s sudden departure.

Another article is titled, “Fictional Washington Post eerily predicted real events“:

WASHINGTON — Felicita Mendez, the campaign director of a leading progressive organization, holds up a copy of a fictional issue of The Washington Post that looks, feels, and smells very much like the real pages of this paper. “It’s uncanny how closely its story echoed what really happened with Trump.”

Distributed four months before Donald Trump fled presidential office, the paper’s tagline was a readers’ first clue that it was an elaborate fantasy rather than a real issue of the paper: Instead of the usual “Democracy Dies in Darkness,” the mock paper read “Democracy Awakens in Action.” The lead story announced that Trump had fled presidential office — eerily prefiguring today’s actual news.

The faux newspaper was handed out to people around Washington, D.C. just a few days before the 2019 Women’s Marches and the content was widely shared online.

Here’s one titled, “From #MeToo to ‘You’re Fired’“:

WASHINGTON — The nasty, brutish, and ultimately short presidency of Donald Trump was only a few hours old when it was met with the counterforce that would define his time in office. Women’s Marches flooded some 650 towns and cities nationwide with protesters waving signs, pushing strollers, chanting slogans, and wearing crocheted pink hats topped with cat ears. The crowd in Washington D.C. alone was estimated to be three times as large as the audience for Trump’s inauguration.

After some men publicly wondered whether they were invited to join, the sight of 4 million women, men, and children packing American streets quickly answered the question. More than 1 percent of the U.S. population participated in the marches, the single largest day of action in the nation’s history. Yet even those demonstrations were dwarfed by the massive protests last Saturday, on what was to mark Trump’s final weekend in office. At least 11 million people marched through and occupied American cities with music, speeches, signs, and chants such as the call and response between women and men, My body, my choice! / Her body, her choice!

There’s even a video of “Coffee with a Scholar” that asks if “robots are just future slaves.”

It really is too bad the issue didn’t include anything on the very real Washington Post fact-checking the president on hamburgers:

Thank goodness. I saw some Washington Post article fact-checking Trump's claims about fast food he bought for Clemson. I knew it had to be a parody. Whew! https://t.co/1TliLWOXIy

— Jesse Kelly (@JesseKellyDC) January 16, 2019

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Washington Post: What’s so wrong about using this particular word that we won’t spell out in our paper? https://t.co/rYqDGWMy2i

— Twitchy Team (@TwitchyTeam) January 6, 2019

Washington Post reporter finds out the hard way that crickets don't die in darkness https://t.co/qjzX0XSJy1

— Twitchy Team (@TwitchyTeam) December 29, 2018