OTTAWA -- Oh, the difference a few characters can make!
U.S. President Donald Trump found himself in CFL country Friday, when he accidentally tagged an Ottawa REDBLACKS player instead of a Pennsylvania radio host in a tweet.
"You go around Pennsylvania and you see Trump signs everywhere. The Donald Trump situation is bigger than the Reagan Revolution. Donald Trump has inspired us.” Trump wrote, quoting WHP 580 morning host R.J. Harris, whose Twitter handle is @RJHarrisWHP580.
But the president accidentally tagged @RjHarris15, an Ottawa REDBLACKS wide receiver—perhaps due to an autocorrection.
A short time later, the CFL replied, "something tells me this isn't you."
Harris told The Bill Carroll Show on Newstalk 580 CFRA it was the most random thing to ever happen to him.
"I was up in bed this morning watching Netflix and I got a notification from a Donald Trump account," he said. "I thought it was a parody account. I thought somebody was just having fun and then, before I could even finish the tweet, I got 150 notifications."
When he realized it was actually the President of the United States who had tagged him, Harris said he started scrambling to figure out what happened and learned Trump had tagged the wrong R.J Harris.
Harris (the REDBLACKS player) said he's not worried about the replies to Trump's tweet, since he knows the president wasn't talking about him.
"It has nothing to do with me," he said. "I'm getting bashed, I'm getting love from his supporters, some people are just ripping me a new one, and I'm not even replying."
But, he said, what he instead chose to do is take all the attention and run with it.
That's when he mentioned the youth football camp he's hosting at his former high school in Gambrills, Maryland.
He earned a few new followers, too.
More than a few, in fact. Harris said he believes he gained several hundred followers since Trump made the tweet.
And despite his phone buzzing like crazy, he said he's taking it in stride.
"I know that if I got into the business of trying to reply, I'd be on Twitter for the next two weeks," he said. "I think it's funny. I'm getting a lot of free publicity. I'm just laughing at it."
RJ Harris the radio host, meanwhile, retweeted Trump and thanked him, but made no mention of the case of mistaken identity.
