Dolly Parton's sister has condemned Donald Trump as 'deranged' after the president posted an AI-generated image of himself arm in arm with the late country icon and claimed she 'really liked me', despite her lifelong refusal to take political sides.
Parton died in Nashville on 25 August at the age of 80 after a brief battle with cancer. Trump ordered US flags lowered for a week, then shared the fabricated portrait on Truth Social with no caption. Lowering the flag for an entertainer is rare, an honour usually reserved for political or military figures.
The picture appeared to show Trump and Parton walking together at the White House, her hand resting on his arm. It was quickly identified as artificial, with the president towering over the singer, who stood barely five feet tall.
Social media users mocked the post, calling the president a 'laughing stock' and noting that the two shared little in common. The image followed earlier AI pictures Trump has shared of himself, including one depicting him as a Christ-like figure.
A day after Parton's death, Trump told conservative radio host Glenn Beck that her passing felt 'like losing a member of the family'. He described her as 'amazing' and said she 'really liked me'.
Trump admitted Parton had never said so publicly, suggesting she stayed quiet to avoid losing part of her fanbase. He offered no statement from her to support the claim, and Beck could be heard laughing during the exchange.
Parton had kept out of party politics for decades. 'I don't do politics. I have too many fans on both sides of the fence,' she once said. She rejected Trump's Presidential Medal of Freedom twice during his first term and declined the honour again under Joe Biden.
Her sister Stella has never been so guarded. A long-standing critic of the president, she wrote that she did not support Trump or his 'deranged, ugly, nasty behaviour', a rebuke that resurfaced as the AI image spread.
Trump's public mourning sits awkwardly beside decisions in Republican-controlled statehouses. Missouri cut funding for Parton's Imagination Library from $6 million (£4.4 million) to $2 million (£1.5 million) and froze new enrolments on 1 July, with 161,361 children already signed up. Missouri had been the first state to fully fund the programme in 2024.
Indiana removed the free book programme entirely from its budget, ending support for more than 125,000 children. Families with newborns can no longer join, and Missouri officials warned the remaining money could run out within four to six months. The Dollywood Foundation, which runs the programme, said its work 'has never felt more meaningful' and vowed to continue.
Parton founded the charity in 1995 as a tribute to her father, who could not read or write, and it has since posted more than 300 million books. The image Trump shared shows a warmth Parton never claimed in life, while her charity now faces a funding gap that could leave thousands of children without the books she spent decades fighting to give them.
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