Amid Afghanistan fallout, Wilmington billboard depicts President Biden eating ice cream

WILMINGTON, N.C. (WECT) - A digital billboard in Wilmington is catching the eyes of drivers but it’s not the ads for insurance or beer that are leaving people with questions.

It’s the bizarre image of President Joe Biden eating an ice cream cone superimposed over a photo of the embassy in Afganistan being evacuated by helicopter.

Another image of Joe Biden peeking out of a window from behind closed blinds flashes across the screen before more conventional advertisements, once again, grab onlookers’ attention.

What the two images are trying to convey is not clear — however, the images do not portray the president in a positive light, and, the billboard caught the eye of Donald Trump Jr.

“This is apparently a billboard in Wilmington North Carolina from the pics that a buddy sent me they get it thanks guys hopefully the rest of the world doesn’t have to keep learning the hard way about the Biden administration’s incompetence,” he wrote on an Instagram post.

The billboard is owned by Tedder Outdoor Media. Donald Tedder, president of the company, said the advertisement was purchased by an individual, but he was unable to give the name of his client due to privacy concerns. It’s not the first time Tedder has published billboards that have garnered attention he said. He has sold advertising space to both sides of the political spectrum, he said, and for groups like PETA.

He also was clear that he would have published a billboard praising the President and that this was not his personal ad, simply a business transaction for him.

As far as any requirements for the billboard company to disclose the purchaser of the ad, simply being political does not appear to meet the requirements put in place for campaign advertising that would require disclosure of who paid for the ad at the bottom of the billboard.

WECT reached out to the president of the New Hanover County GOP as well as the Democratic Party to ask for their organization’s thoughts on the billboard, but at the time of publication, no responses were offered.

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