Image credit: Twitter @IanKullgren

Washington: The United States capital was swamped with fake editions of the popular ‘The Washington Post’ newspaper on Wednesday, which announced the ‘resignation’ of President Donald Trump. The ‘future edition’ of The Washington Post dated May 1, 2019 was even distributed freely near and around the White House.

The fake newspaper carried a large, six-column banner headline 'Unpresidented: Trump hastily departs White House, ending crisis'. A correspondent of Indian news agency PTI was given the newspaper edition outside the White House on the corner of 17th and Pennsylvania Avenue.

"Grab this special edition of The Washington Post. This is free. You will never get this," a middle-aged lady told the PTI correspondent.

The reputed daily, often at the receiving end of Trump’s diatribe, promptly dismissed the authenticity of the edition.

"There are fake print editions of The Washington Post being distributed around downtown DC, and we are aware of a website attempting to mimic The Post's. They are not Post products, and we are looking into this," The Washington Post tweeted.

.@washingtonpost you might want to deal with the lady handing out fake copies of the Post outside Union Station. I tried to explain why this is problematic but she wasn’t having it. pic.twitter.com/pjohcCFSx7 — Ian Kullgren (@IanKullgren) January 16, 2019

The lead story of the fake newspaper edition, with the byline Lisa Chung, said Trump put in his papers on April 30, 2019.

"He (Trump) issued no formal statement, though four White House sides - who spoke on condition of anonymity - claim that they found a napkin on the president's desk in the Oval Office on the evening of April 30, scrawled in red ink with the following message: 'Blame Crooked Hillary and Hfior and the Fake News Media," the fake edition claimed.

The fake edition went on to claim that the move had triggered celebrations across the world, including in the Indian capital of New Delhi.

"Vice President Mike Pence took the oath of presidency in the bible of his grandmother, at his hurried swearing in," read another article.

While some of the articles in the fake newspaper were attributed to Indian American reporters Haritha Jadeja and Susan Patel, one of them was credited to global news agency Associated Press.

The White House has so far not reacted to the fake newspaper circulation that came amidst an unprecedented partial US government shutdown.