'Too damn funny': Did Trump accidentally throw shade at Mike Pence in tweet praising Ivanka?

As Ivanka Trump arrived in South Korea on Friday (23 February) for the closing ceremony of the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics, her father US President Donald Trump said they could have "no better or smarter person" representing the nation. The first daughter and senior White House adviser will lead the US delegation at the weekend's closing ceremony for the Winter Games on Sunday and has already attended some of the Olympic sporting events.

"We cannot have a better, or smarter, person representing our country," Trump wrote in an early morning tweet acknowledging her arrival in South Korea.

Dining with South Korean President Moon Jae-in at the presidential Blue House on Friday, Ivanka echoed her father's call for "maximum pressure" on North Korea into giving up its nuclear programme and missile tests.

"I thank you for hosting us all here tonight as we reaffirm our bonds of friendship, of cooperation, of partnership and reaffirm our commitment to our maximum pressure campaign to ensure that the Korean peninsula is denuclearised," Ivanka said.

Meanwhile, some Twitter users pointed out something odd about the president's words of praise over his daughter's visit - Vice President Mike Pence already represented the US in a visit to South Korea as the head of the US delegation to the Olympics during the opening ceremonies earlier this month.

However, Pence's trip was largely overshadowed by the presence of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un's sister Kim Yo-jong - dubbed "North Korea's Ivanka" - who was formally invited by President Moon to the event. The vice president garnered media attention for avoiding Kim Yo-jong after Pence and his wife were seated just feet away from her and North Korea's ceremonial head of state Kim Yong-nam at the opening ceremonies.

Pence was set to meet with North Korean officials during the Games as well but North Korea reportedly abruptly cancelled at the last minute.

Social media users, however, were too quick to mock and snicker at the president's tweet and questioned whether it was an intentional or accidental dig at his own vice president.

"Who wants to tell him @VP was there last week," CNN's Kate Bennett tweeted.

Others questioned the president's assertions that they could not find a better person to represent the country at the Games.

"Maybe the Secretary of State? The Ambassador to the UN?" national security attorney Bradley P. Moss tweeted. "You know, people who actually have some professional qualification aside from being your daughter?"

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