We Gave Karoline Leavitt's Husband A Donald Trump Tan

Karoline Leavitt's husband, Nicholas Riccio, seems content to stay out of the spotlight. However, when he does make an occasional appearance in photos with the White House press secretary, it seems to cause a lot of confusion for people. Since Riccio is over 30 years older than Leavitt, sometimes people mistake Riccio for Leavitt's dad. Beyond Leavitt's dad and her husband, Donald Trump also occupies an important place in Leavitt's life. Riccio and Trump have some similarities, like their careers in real estate. Some of the president's 2020 campaign events were even held at Riccio's New Hampshire properties, years before Leavitt and Riccio's romance began.

Leavitt's Trump obsession has been evident many times, so we couldn't help wondering what it would be like if her husband had more in common with Trump than just political and professional common ground. To find out, we used Photoshop to give Leavitt's husband an orangey complexion to rival Trump's most prominent tan.

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As expected, the color shift isn't doing Riccio any favors. The darker hue makes the crinkles around his eyes look more prominent, and it ages his appearance overall. It also creates a weird contrast between his face and his navy suit, which is a shame, since the 'fit looks great on him in the unaltered photo.

If Nicholas Riccio and Donald Trump did want to look more alike, the president would be better off trying to imitate Riccio and showcase his natural skin tone. The List also used Photoshop to remove Trump's disastrous tan, and the results were stunning. Trump's more believable skin tone would help him turn back the clock many years. Others have tried this same experiment, with people responding positively to the change.

"Trump's orange skin is a target of ridicule –- of a man obsessed with vanity yet marked by signs of failed masculinity," Tania Woloshyn, a tanning historian, wrote in The Conversation. "We find the color funny because it's an all-too-obvious applied coating that fails to convince anyone of natural pigmentation." Unfortunately, Trump's shown no signs of wanting to switch up his makeup routine. If anything, Trump's tan has drastically evolved over the years to become even more intense.

While Karoline Leavitt has fallen into an awful bronzer habit herself, Riccio appears to have escaped this pitfall most of the time. However, The List's Photoshop experiment wasn't the only instance when Riccio's complexion looked unflattering in a photo. An Instagram pic from a September 2024 family event left Riccio looking like he'd skimped on the sunscreen. Maybe it was a camera issue, but the redness made Riccio's face look closer in color to his burgundy tie rather than his usual skin tone.