Fox News anchor Brian Kilmeade backtracks over showing doctored image of judge

Co-host Brian Kilmeade appears on the set of Fox & Friends. Photo / AP

Fox News' Brian Kilmeade said on Friday that he had aired "in jest" a doctored photo that appeared to depict the judge who approved the FBI search warrant of former President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate.

The false photo showed US Magistrate Bruce Reinhart's face replacing a real photo of Jeffrey Epstein receiving a foot massage from his former girlfriend, Ghislaine Maxwell.

It was further doctored to make it appear that the judge was holding a bottle of bourbon and package of Oreo cookies.

Kilmeade, who was subbing for Tucker Carlson on Thursday night, showed the picture at the end of the hour-long show.

"This is the judge in charge of the, of the, um, as you know, of the warrant, and we'll see if he's going to release it next," Kilmeade said. "He likes Oreos and whiskey."

Sean Hannity, whose show was about to begin, appeared to correct Kilmeade.

"I think that's actually a picture of Jeffrey Epstein with somebody putting his head on there," Hannity said. "I'm guessing. I don't know."

Brian Kilmeade, filling in for Tucker Carlson tonight, shared a clearly fake, photoshopped image of the judge involved in approving the Mar-a-Lago warrant pic.twitter.com/W3cxHdy6id

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) August 12, 2022

Kilmeade said, "it might be his plane. Who knows?"

In a tweet on Friday, Kilmeade said the image was sourced on screen to a meme pulled from Twitter and wasn't real.

"This depiction never took place and we wanted to make clear that we were showing a meme in jest," Kilmeade wrote.