He has mentioned the cover four times since it was published last week – suggesting the vice-president resembles everyone from Elizabeth Taylor to his wife, Melania. What is really going on?Mon 19 Aug 2024 18.32 CESTShare

Name: Time Magazine’s Kamala Harris cover.

Age: Published last week.

Appearance: Well, that’s the question.

Hang on, what’s the question? Does the magazine’s illustrated portrait of Kamala Harris make her look like “the most beautiful actress ever to live”?

Eh? Who’s that? Unclear, but it might be Sophia Loren, or possibly Elizabeth Taylor.

I’ve looked at the picture, and no, she doesn’t look like either of them. She looks perfectly nice, but definitely like Kamala Harris. Why? Because that’s what Donald Trump said about the illustration; that it makes Harris look like Loren or Taylor. He has also said the sketch resembles “our great first lady Melania”.

Only in the sense that it represents a human woman. What on earth is going on? Trump appears to be in a huff because he thinks the picture is too flattering. It’s got so severely under his skin he’s mentioned it four times so far since it was published.

Delicious. Tell me more. He made the Melania claim in his Elon Musk interview last Monday (wrapping up, weirdly, with “She’s a beautiful woman, so we’ll leave it at that”). Then, at a rally on Wednesday, he said he wanted to use the cover artist himself, because he liked the artist “very much”. On Thursday, at a press conference, he called the decision to use an illustration “crazy”. Finally, on Saturday, he came out with the Sophia Loren thing at another rally.

Oof. It actually got worse after the Loren bit: “I say that I’m much better looking than her. Much better. Much better. I’m a better-looking person than Kamala,” he added.

The repetition definitely makes it more convincing. The thing is, Trump is famously obsessed with Time covers. He has claimed – wrongly – to be the most frequent cover star (that was Richard Nixon). He also hung fake Time covers featuring pictures of him in his golf clubs. So this is hitting him squarely where it hurts: in the Time-related vanity.

The rightwing media has grumbled about overly complimentary coverage of Harris recently. Is it remotely possible Trump has a point about this picture? No. It actually seems to be based very closely on a recent photo. New York Magazine did some detective work and the “photo-illustration by Neil Jamieson” credit indicates it was drawn quite precisely from a 22 July photograph by Andrew Harnik for Getty Images.

I’ve just looked again and the text under the illustration reads: “Her moment”. Is Trump’s ranting really insecurity about Harris smashing fundraising records, seducing the TikTok generation and drawing ahead on national polling? No. It’s definitely about her looking prettier than him in his favourite publication.

Do say: “She’s a beautiful woman so we’ll leave it at that.”

Don’t say: “Time cover is brat.”