A SINGLE photo has led to former FBI director James Comey being indicted for a second time.
One of Trump’s posted on Instagram and later deleted a beach photo of seashells arranged to read ’86 47′ in May 2025, with a simple caption: “Cool shell information on my beach walk”.
Former FBI Director James Comey was indicted for a second time Credit: AP
James Comey posted and later deleted a mysterious photo, which was found to have a threatening message Credit: Instagram
Republicans saw the post as a message of violence against Donald Trump, and Comey was later investigated by the Secret Service.
During a press conference on Tuesday, May 28, 2026, Acting US Attorney General Todd Blanche said : “You are not allowed to threaten the President of the United States of America.”
But what is the hidden message behind the mysterious beach photo?
What does 86 mean?
The number 86 is a slang defined by the Merriam-Webster dictionary as an expression of disapproval.
Informally, it can mean “to reject”, “to ban”, “to refuse to serve” or “to remove”.
Restaurant staff may sometimes use the numbers to mark a menu item that is no longer available or a customer who’s had one too many and shouldn’t be served anymore.
The term is believed to have come from 1930s soda-counter slang for an item that was sold out.
The true original of the phrase is unknown, but according to Merriam-Webster’s research, it was created as a rhyming slang for nix, which means “to veto” or “to reject”.
What does 86 47 mean?
While the number 86 has more of a generic meaning on its own, 47 likely refers to Donald Trump himself because he is the 47th president of the United States.
The post quickly sparked outrage from Republicans and Trump administration officials.
Comey insisted he did not know what the numbers meant, but Trump has disputed that.
“I didn’t realise some folks associate those numbers with violence,” he said. “It never occurred to me, but I oppose violence of any kind, so I took the post down.”
Trump argued that “a child knows what that meant”.
In an interview for Fox News, the US president said: “That meant assassination, and it says it loud and clear.
“Now, he wasn’t very competent, but he was competent enough to know what that meant.”
The indictment comes just days after a gunman was charged with trying to assassinate Trump at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner.
Eze Chidiebere Paul
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