Joe Rogan raised eyebrows Wednesday when discussing an image of Minneapolis ICE shooting victim Alex Preti that was mistakenly featured in a segment on MS NOW that was apparently doctored to make him look “handsome,” calling it the opposite of “what CNN did to me” during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Rogan and conservative commentator Andrew Wilson were discussing the weekend shooting of Preti by ICE agents in Minneapolis on Wednesday’s episode of “The Joe Rogan Experience,” when the host cut to clearly enhanced footage.
“Did you see what MSNBC did to his image?” Logan said midway through the discussion, incorrectly assuming that the media had done the tampering.
“Yes,” Wilson replied. “Where did they make that up?”
Logan has consistently used the old “MSNBC” moniker for the cable news network, which was rebranded to MS NOW late last year. MS NOW had no comment, but a person familiar with the situation told TheWrap that the images were taken from the internet and were not created by the network. Its origin was not yet clear.
The altered portrait of the 37-year-old veteran nurse was used in at least one segment of MS NOW (Monday’s episode of “Deadline: The White House” hosted by Nicole Wallace), and the station later acknowledged that the photo had been doctored in an editor’s note.
“Basically, they did the opposite of what CNN did to me,” Logan continued. “You know, in the age of coronavirus, CNN made me green, ugly, death-looking, and made him handsome… so people would sympathize more with him getting shot, which is kind of wild. Like, are ugly people less valuable?”
“That’s crazy to me,” he continued, looking at the side-by-side images on the screen. “Look at the difference. They shortened his face. They gave him a little tan. They widened his face a little. They made him a little more handsome.”
Wilson said that the person who edited the photo “gave it a little bit of Chad’s chin.”
After an X user pointed out that the altered image was used in the “Deadline: White House” segment, MS NOW added an editor’s note to the YouTube link that read, “Editor’s note: MS NOW has replaced the original thumbnail image for this video. The previous thumbnail used was an AI-enhanced image of Alex Pretti.”
Logan and Wilson continued their side-by-side analysis, noting that the nose had gotten smaller and the shoulders wider.
“They changed the color tone,” Logan said. “It’s wild. I mean, they changed his teeth. … They gave him veneers.”
Watch the entire exchange in the video above.
Joe Rogan mocks AI-altered Alex Pretti image that MS NOW mistakenly aired: ‘The opposite of what CNN did to me’ The post video first appeared on TheWrap.
