Former official photographer for the White House claimed that he is being threatened with legal action over his own photo. Pete Souza said that the Presidential office is threatening to sue him for displaying an image he took of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton on his personal website.
Mr. Souza got on Instagram to vent his frustrations, saying that the photo was clicked aboard Air Force One in 2009 during President Obama’s first overseas trip in his role. He included the image in a photo gallery on his site after leaving the White House in 2017.
“Now I am being threatened with legal action for displaying this photograph on my website. Say what?” Mr. Souza wrote in the caption of his post.
Serving as the official photographer for the entirety of President Obama’s term, he said that he was informed that he infringed WENN Rights International’s ownership of the image. He also added that the photograph had been placed on an official gallery of Obama’s first 100 days in office and that there was no copyright involved in official White House photos.
“You can’t make this s*** up,” Mr. Souza said. He further went on to say that he had been told that he was “legally obligated to compensate (WENN) for the damage caused by this copyright infringement”.
“So to recap: I made this photograph. It is in the public domain. WENN is licensing this image for publication. Copytrack is threatening to file legal action against me for displaying this photograph on my website since their partner WENN claims they own the copyright to the image,” Mr. Souza wrote on Instagram.
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