President Donald Trump made an obscene gesture with his middle finger and mouthed an expletive to a person who shouted at him during a tour of a Ford factory in Michigan on Tuesday — a reaction the White House said was “appropriate” given the heckling.
A cellphone video captured Trump, who was visiting the Ford F-150 plant in Dearborn, twice mouthing “f— you” as he pointed to someone calling up to him from the factory floor below. The president subsequently raised his middle finger toward the heckler as he continued walking. He then waved.
Out of frame in the video, a person can be heard yelling “pedophile protector” just before Trump mouthed the insult — an apparent reference to the Trump administration’s handing of the investigation into the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
White House communications director Steven Cheung confirmed that the scene captured in the video was authentic.
“A lunatic was wildly screaming expletives in a complete fit of rage, and the President gave an appropriate and unambiguous response,” Cheung said in a statement to The Washington Post.
Am I crazy or did Trump just flip off some hecklers?
pic.twitter.com/Zm3cRdD31O
— JT Lewis (@thejtlewis) January 13, 2026
It wasn’t immediately clear whether the individual shouting at Trump was an employee of the factory, which Trump toured before giving a speech at the Detroit Economic Club. Elsewhere on the tour, Ford workers could be seen cheering and taking selfies with the president.
Officials at Ford did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Trump was joined during the tour by Bill Ford, Ford’s executive chairman and the grandson of Henry Ford, and Jim Farley, the company’s president and CEO.
Trump has faced criticism from Democrats — and in some cases from within his MAGA movement — for dismissing the federal investigation into Epstein. The president has also repeatedly referred to that investigation as a “hoax.”
Trump was friends with Epstein and traveled in the same social circles before cutting ties in the early 2000s. He initially opposed legislation requiring the Justice Department to release its files on Epstein. After it became clear last year that Republicans did not have the votes to block the effort, Trump said he would no longer oppose releasing the files.
Trump has not been accused of participating in Epstein’s criminal conduct.
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