The Washington Post Mistakenly Cites Clickhole Story About Green Day

A respected news publication made a major boo-boo when it quoted a fake article in a recent story about Green Day.

The Washington Post Quotes Fake Green Day Story

The Washington Post, earlier this week, reported about the current campaign of the band's fanbase in the United Kingdom to bring back "American Idiot" on top of the charts. This was a response to an upcoming visit of U.S. President Donald J. Trump.

Unfortunately for the publication, while writing about the effort, it quoted a fake story from a satirical site. According to Spin, when the article was first published by The Washington Post earlier this week, it cited ClickHole, a site ran by The Onion.

"But despite the song's ubiquity, Armstrong waited 13 years to reveal — in an article he wrote for Clickhole.com — that the 'American Idiot' was President George W. Bush," read the original report. "'The main reason we made George W. Bush the 'American Idiot' is because he started a war,' Armstrong wrote."

The ClickHole story quoted by the report was titled "Enough Time Has Passed To Reveal George W. Bush Was The 'American Idiot'" and it claimed that the Green Day frontman wrote the piece for the site. In the essay, Armstrong claimed that Bush was the idiot because he started a war.

The Washington Post has since amended the mistake and left a footnote saying that ClickHole is a satire site. The singer-songwriter did not write the piece admitting that the former U.S. President was the inspiration behind the popular track, although it has long been known that the rock band despises Bush (as well as current president Trump).

Green Day Reenters UK Charts

In related news, fans were able to bring back Green Day's "American Idiot" back in charts. Although they have not quite reached the top spot yet, the song originally released in 2004 reentered the Amazon UK best-seller list on Tuesday, July 10, at the 18th spot.

Fans of the band and critics of President trump were encouraged to stream the track as many times as possible this week as a protest against the arrival of the controversial world leader in the UK on July 12. Trump is set to meet Prime Minister Theresa May and Queen Elizabeth II during his four-day stay.

A crowdsourced inflatable angry baby Trump is also set to fly the skies of London to protest the arrival of the U.S. president.

Tags

Green Day, Donald Trump