White House press secretary Sean Spicer confused and amused Twitter uses in equal measure yesterday after he retweeted a post about him published on satirical news site The Onion. 

The video caption read: "@SeanSpicer's role in the Trump administration will be to provide the American public with robust and clearly articulated misinformation." 

Mr Spicer appeared to have not read or properly understood the text, retweeting the video with the comment "You nailed it. Period!"

Sean Spicer seemed to miss the joke.

The retweet sent howls of laughter rippling through the Twittersphere, as users struggled to comprehend just how the White House press secretary could retweet a satirical news site as fact. 

Others pointed out that even if Mr Spicer was in on the joke, admitting to being the source of "misinformation" was not very funny. 

This is not the first time the former radio correspondent has run into trouble on Twitter. Less than a month ago, Mr Spicer mistakenly tweeted out a password twice in two days. 

The Onion has a history of duping people and organisations which should know better. 

Back in 2012, the Chinese communist party's official mouthpiece treated an article in The Onion declaring North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Un "the sexiest man alive" as true. 

In 2011, Iranian news agency shared news published on The Onion that rural Americans preferred Iran's then-Prime Minister Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to Barack Obama.

And in 2006, Denmark's TV2 ran an article based on a piece in The Onion which said actor Sean Penn was furious that somebody had taken the email address seanpenn@gmail.com.