How many lies can you possibly squeeze in, in only one hour? Well, according to The Huffington Post, lying Donald Trump managed to make things up an astonishing 71 times.
Critics of Donald Trump’s presidential campaign sometimes complain about the media’s lack of fact-checking when covering Trump statements. The Huffington Post objects that it’s because Trump makes so many false statements that it’s impossible to keep up with the fact-checking.
To prove a point, they assigned reporters specifically to analyze a 12,000-word transcript of Trump’s town hall event, which had aired on CNN.
The reporters found a whopping 71 separate claims by Trump which was inaccurate, misleading or just questionable. Statistically, that makes one falsehood every 169 words, or 1.16 per minute.
For example:
“I see Hillary with Benghazi, you know the famous ad, three in the morning, guess what, the phone rang, she wasn’t there.”
An email has surfaced showing that Clinton did miss a briefing because she was sleeping. But it was not a phone call, and it was 10:43 a.m. Considering the hour, Clinton was likely overseas.
“Nobody respects our president.”
This is just not true. Obama is respected, loved and admired by so many people both within the U.S and abroad.
“We owe $19 trillion, we have another $2 trillion because of the very, very bad omnibus budget that was just signed.”
Yes, there is a $19 trillion debt. But the very, very bad omnibus was in fact $1.1 trillion.
“We get nothing.”
Trump says the Republicans came out empty-handed in the omnibus spending bill, but the party did get some wins like lifting the oil export ban, tightening the visa waiver program, and stopping the IRS from going after 501c4s.
“Most people didn’t know that we are taking care of Japan’s military needs.”
In fact, it’s Japan which spends money on U.S. military installations there.
“Iran is going to have [a nuclear bomb] within 10 years.”
Actually, the Iran agreement rolls freezes their nuclear program for 15 years, and some factors are permanent, like rigorous inspections and a ban on researching, making or possessing a nuclear bomb.
“Nobody wants to call it a war.”
Actually, it was the Bush administration which coined the phrase “War on Terror.”
“My father didn’t leave a great fortune.”
The New York Times reported that when Fred Trump died in 1999, he left $250-300 million, which for most of us would consider a great fortune, indeed.
“Well, the greatest function of all by far [for the U.S. government] is security for our nation. I would also say health care, I would also say education.”
Trump has called for disbanding the Department of Education.
“I am self-funding.”
PolitiFact made an evaluation and found it to be only partly true since he also accepts individual donations.
“I’m a very honest guy.”
PolitiFact put together another list of false statements made by Trump, and tighter with The Huffington Post article with all the 71 inaccurate, misleading or questionable claims, they will make a perfect April Fool’s Day read, except they are not jokes. Lying Donald Trump should perhaps consider scheduling all his speeches on April 1st.
Featured image by Gage Skidmore from Flickr. Permission to use under Creative Commons.
