Shartgate is a reminder that America’s political media environment has two different standards, depending on who is in power and which network pretends to be concerned.
An online pearl clutch has rocked the social medias for the last few days. So much so that Snopes had to take a look into the situation. Allegedly, a White House media event for the signing of an executive order was abruptly ended, and journalists were chased from the room when President Donald Trump fouled his diaper. Snopes left the claim “unrated” because they could neither prove nor disprove Dianper Don’s whoopsie.
In a video posted to YouTube by Forbes from the Jan. 29, 2026, news conference during which Trump signed an executive order aimed at addiction recovery efforts, the president appears to abruptly end the discussion and signal for reporters to be removed from the room.
Photographs from the event are available to view on the credible image repository Getty Images.
While the video was authentic and showed no signs of digital manipulation or content generated by artificial intelligence, there was no evidence to support the claim that Trump pooped himself during the meeting. There was no way for Snopes to independently verify the rumor, so we have left this claim unrated.
Had this been Joe Biden, we’d be deep into day 3 of Fox News non-stop coverage. Wall-to-wall chyrons. Scatalogical experts. Panel discussions. Jesse Watters would have something disgusting to say.
Instead, we get a shrug from MSNow and the collective understanding that some things are just not worth the public’s time. It is not the alleged incident that matters, however, but the silence around it. While the Biden Administration would have spent days defending Biden’s fitness for office, Trump will just roll along, sharting and babbling.
the time-point of the video which amounts to the gross olfactory focus of the internetz is at ~43 seconds [1] when trump shifts to touch hands with someone and then 'Lady in green' reflexively does the nose gesture ...oy.
[1] https://youtu.be/u_6kGluvINg?si=Dyxnt2_8YLViiB6R&t=43
It’s not surprising that a small amount spills out from time to time if you remind yourself that the orange pedo protector is full of shit.