The Long Island Rail Road's attempt to jump into the hubbub surrounding President Trump's "covfefe" tweet didn't amuse riders Wednesday morning.
In a tweet sent from the official @LIRR account just after 8 a.m., the rail posted a photo of a cup of coffee on board a LIRR train and captioned it, "How many #LIRR commuters are enjoying their morning covfefe?"
It was a reference to Trump's latest spelling blunder on Twitter, when the president posted shortly after midnight, "Despite the constant negative press covfefe." The tweet lit up the Internet as people tried to figure out what he was trying to say, though some suspected the word was supposed to read "coverage."
But others had fun with the tweet, and the hashtag #covfefe quickly began to trend. When LIRR tried to get in on the action, commuters -- still sore from Tuesday's nightmare rail fail -- were quick to respond.
"None, cause the service is s---," one person responded to LIRR.
"Don't covfefe up this evenings commute," one man replied.
"It'll be cold covfefe by the time we get there," said another.
"If there's one account that shouldn't be making jokes this morning..." a rider tweeted.
One commuter summed up the sentiment of many of the responses, writing, "WHY are you trying to make friends through Twitter? You're not a 'fun' brand. You're a railroad. Better servivice is the way to go."
MTA spokesman Aaron Donovan later told News 4 in a statement, "We completely understand riders' continuing frustration with Amtrak's infrastructure failures. Going forward, we've instructed all of our staff, even the ones who think they're funny, to leave the jokes to the comedians."
Just a day earlier, thousands of LIRR riders experienced crippling delays and cancellations on their way to Penn Station after a power problem in one of the East River tunnels stranded multiple trains and forced diversions. It was the latest in a series of Amtrak infrastructure problems that have forced officials to speed up the timeline for work at Penn Station, which will happen over the course of eight weeks this summer.
