Washington DC - President Donald Trump's White House has come under fire after sharing a photo of an arrested protester on social media that they digitally altered to make her appear in distress.

According to The Guardian, Nekima Levy Armstrong, a civil rights attorney, was one of three people arrested on Thursday in connection with a recent protest at a church in St Paul, Minnesota, where the pastor is a known ICE official.

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem shared the original photo of the arrest that same day, which shows Armstrong maintaining a nonchalant expression as she is arrested by an ICE agent.

A half hour after Noem's post, the White House shared a different photo that shows Armstrong with a seemingly darker complexion and hysterically crying.

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When reached for comment, the White House sent an X post from Deputy Communications Director Kaelan Dorr, who criticized people who "feel the need to reflexively defend perpetrators of heinous crimes," and vowed, "The memes will continue."

Hany Farid, a computer science professor at the University of California, told the BBC that this is "not the first time" the White House has shared AI-generated content, which is "troubling on several levels."

"Not only are they sharing deceptive content, they are making it increasingly more difficult for the public to trust anything they share with us," he added.