President Donald Trump just can seem to help himself. Anytime a reporter, especially a female reporter, asks him a question he doesn’t like he immediately launches a verbal assault and inevitably calls them “fake news,” among other churlish names.
That very thing happened again Friday when an NBC reporter confronted him about a false claim on a cost-saving measure he’d been bragging about for days.
The questioning during a White House media session with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán followed Trump touting Walmart’s Thanksgiving meal basket, again, as proof that groceries are actually very affordable, something he’s been doing all week since Democrats soundly beat Republicans in the off-year elections Tuesday.
But the fact-check told a different story.
“I just heard this yesterday that Walmart said that the Thanksgiving was 25 more expensive, 25 percent more expensive under Biden. That’s big to me. That’s a, that’s a big number to me because Walmart’s respected. I mean, Walmart is Walmart, and, you know, they’re giving you prices,” Trump rambled before pivoting to accuse Democrats of trying to fool Americans over the economy.
“It was 25 percent Walmart just announced it two days ago, 25 percent cheaper this year, will be cheaper to have Thanksgiving than it was a year ago under sleepy Joe Biden,” Trump astoundingly bragged.
That’s when NBC reporter Monica Alba called him out on his deceptiveness.
“The Walmart Thanksgiving meals and it is cheaper, but it also contains less, as affordability —” the reporter began, but Trump immediately interrupted her
“Well, I haven’t heard that,” he denied, speaking over her before asking, “Who are you with?”
“I’m with NBC News, sir.” The room erupted in laughter and that seemed to only egg on Trump to turn up his obnoxiousness.
“NBC. You’re fake news,” he rudely replied.
He continued talking over her, “NBC’s gone down the tubes along with most of the rest of them.”
But she wasn’t backing down. “If I might ask, why do you think there’s such a disconnect between the economy that you’re describing day to day and the way many Americans say they’re feeling?” she managed to ask by flipping the script and talking over him.
A stoic Trump went on the defensive with a nonanswer, but the reporter did manage to ensure she wasn’t completely sidelined.
“Well, they feel better about our country right now, other than the shutdown which was caused by the Democrats and could be ended by the Democrats,” he declared.
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Social media was furious with Trump’s behavior.
“He always does that. He always asks reporters who they are with. And then cries out “fake news” if he doesn’t like them. Sick of this,” a Threads user distinctly noted.
“He is so far from honest that he literally gets angry at even hearing the truth,” Threads poster Toby proclaimed.
Another piled on, “God he’s special. The confrontational paranoid is part of the dementia diagnosis. My mother suffered from Alzheimer’s and she told me I was stealing her money and the truth which I showed her she said was fake. HE HAS DEMENTIA”
And this comment from a viewer furious with both Trump and others in the room, “Why are people laughing when he says “fake news?” Why is no one backing her up and calling him out? They just chuckle and let him lie and bully..”
At a different event this week, Trump boasted about the economy, again, spewing more falsehoods about lower prices.
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“We have energy down to a pretty low point right now. In the United States, we’re drilling. Drill, baby drill, we call it. But energy costs are very low,” he insisted even though heating and cooling costs are up across the country, and NPR reported the cost of electricity has spiked 40 percent since February.
“Our general costs are very low. And I just saw that Walmart came out with a statement last night. They’ve done it for many years, that Thanksgiving this year will cost 25% less than Thanksgiving last year under sleepy Joe Biden,” Trump slyly asserted.
CNN fact-checked Trump and reported that Walmart’s Thanksgiving meal basket is cheaper this year because it contains six fewer items than last year’s basket.
