Summary first, from Greg Sargent, on Trump’s three lies in three tweets:
To recap: Lie No. 1 is that thousands of U.S.-based Muslims celebrated 9/11. Lie No. 2 is that the disabled reporter’s original story backed Trump and that the reporter backtracked on it. Lie No. 3 is that Trump didn’t mock that disabled reporter (in fact, he flapped his hands around frantically after saying, “you gotta see this guy!”).
Last night Meryl Streep spoke at the Golden Globes. Donald Trump responded to her with three tweets, and as Sargent demonstrates in the analysis below, Trump’s three tweets contain three lies. See, Meryl Streep called out Trump’s bullying and lies. Trump just hit back — with still more lies.
Here’s the text of Trump’s three tweets, combined:
[1] Meryl Streep, one of the most over-rated actresses in Hollywood, doesn’t know me but attacked last night at the Golden Globes. She is a…..[2] Hillary flunky who lost big. For the 100th time, I never “mocked” a disabled reporter (would never do that) but simply showed him…….[3]”groveling” when he totally changed a 16 year old story that he had written in order to make me look bad. Just more very dishonest media!
Sargent replies:
Here Trump is telling two lies about a third lie. A quick review: Trump’s mockery of a disabled reporter came after he claimed “thousands and thousands” of Muslims living in America celebrated 9/11. Kovaleski had written an article just after 9/11 that claimed law enforcement “detained and questioned a number of people who were allegedly seen celebrating the attacks.” Under fire for his falsehood about celebratory Muslims, Trump cited that article to push back, even though an “alleged” “number” is hardly proof of “thousands.” In response to that, the reporter put out a statementsaying he did not witness Trump’s version of events. But Trump cited that statement as proof that the reporter had dishonestly backtracked on a story that backed Trump’s position (a lie Trump repeated in Monday’s tweets). That’s how Trump’s mockery of the reporter arose: He waved his arms and mock-quoted the reporter saying “I don’t know what I said!” (See Glenn Kessler’s extensive anatomy of the full story.)
Sargent’s post on this is excellent, and the only change that I’d make is that his recap should be a summary at the beginning of his post. On content, though, he’s assessed Trump nicely.
(One additional point: Trump says he doesn’t care about media celebrities, but that’s false, too: it’s what he is, and he can’t stop watching others who are.)