AN IMAGE OF a tweet that appears to depict Hillary Clinton calling Conor McGregor a future president has duped people into thinking it is real, despite being an edited image likely meant as a joke.

The image is an alteration of an actual tweet, published by Clinton in 2016, in which she posted a photo of herself alongside the words “Happy birthday to this future president.”

The original tweet gained further traction after Clinton’s defeat in the 2016 US presidential election the following month; it had not aged well.

However, while the tweet may have been known to many American users in 2016, it is unlikely to be so familiar now to an Irish audience.

Which is why it may have been confusing when, on 15 July, the day after McGregor’s birthday, he shared on his social media a screenshot that showed a variation of “Happy birthday to this future president” tweet by Clinton. The childhood image of her was replaced with a photo of McGregor as a young boy.

“Thank you @HillaryClinton,” McGregor wrote.

It is unclear if McGregor believed it was a real image, or had shared it in jest. He had also replied on Instagram to a Happy Birthday post by a fan blogger with the account name “OurLadyMelania” with the words “Thank you FLOTUS”, referring to the First Lady of the United States.

The post plays on McGregor’s previous suggestions that he would run for president. However, it had seemed unlikely he would get the nominations needed to run, even before dramatic court hearings earlier this month.His appeal against a civil finding that he was liable of the 2018 sexual assault of Dublin woman led to the Court of Appeal making a referral to the DPP about supposed fresh evidence that McGregor initially wanted to submit but dropped at the 11th hour. 

In either case, the ‘Clinton post’ appears to have fooled some people.

“Please tell me this not real?!” one Facebook user wrote.

“He definitely tweeted thank you Hilary,” another responded.

Interestingly, many of the commenters who think Clinton’s message to McGregor is real seem to imply that this reflects badly on McGregor.

“The woman behind Pizzagate crawling up another useful idiot’s ass,” one user put it.

(Pizzagate is the name of a baseless conspiracy theory that often featured Hillary Clinton as a villainous mastermind).

“So we know that he’s definitely been compromised,” another user wrote.

The image of McGregor was not the only part of Clinton’s post that was altered. The date was changed to 15 July 2025. No such post was published on that date by Hillary Clinton’s account on X (formerly Twitter).

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