Campaign 2016 updates: Trump campaign defends comparing refugees to poisoned Skittles

Donald Trump Jr. appears to have used a copyrighted image in his tweet comparing the danger of Syrian refugees to a bowl of poisoned Skittles.

A reverse-image search of the photograph shows that it originated on the photo-sharing site Flickr, where British photographer David Kittos posted it in 2010.

People who upload photos to Flickr can choose the license level of their images. Some opt to make their photos available for anyone to use via a Creative Commons license. However, this particular image was copyrighted by the photographer.

“This was six years ago when there were no Syrian refugees at the time, and it was never done with the intention of spreading a political message,” Kittos told the BBC.

He told BuzzFeed that he did not give the Trump campaign approval to use the photo.

“The picture was lifted from my Flickr account without permission. I don’t approve of its use by Mr. Trump or his politics,” Kittos wrote in an email.

Kittos himself is a refugee, whose family fled Cyprus during Turkish occupation in 1974, when he was 6.

“I would never approve the use of this image against refugees,” Kittos said to the BBC.

He said he was uncertain about whether he'd take legal action.