CNN Fact-Checker Torpedoes Trump Over Gaffes and Whoppers at Cabinet Meeting

CNN senior reporter Daniel Dale called President Donald Trump out over multiple gaffes and whoppers from his most recent Cabinet meeting, including “mixing up” two wars that he claimed weren’t wars — then later called wars.

The president held a Cabinet meeting on Wednesday that featured the familiar elements that the public has come to expect from such events, including round-robin remarks from Trump officials, lengthy digressions and interjections from Trump, and a Q&A with the MAGA-fied press pool.

Dale dropped a fact check on Wednesday night that zeroed in on a raft of false claims, as well as a moment in which Trump got his wars “mixed up.”

During his remarks, Trump revived his insistence that he doesn’t call the Iran War a “war” — then confused the “conflict” with his operation in Venezuela:

The stock market has set 68 all-time record highs since the election. So, 68 days, we hit all-time highs. We’re right there now. And the average 401k, and that’s despite the conflict. I don’t go to war, I go to conflict. Despite the conflict with Venezuela, who no longer has a Navy, no longer has an Air Force, no longer has a lot of people that were leading the country into very bad places, their leadership is gone. Their second-run leadership is gone, and we’re dealing with their third — half of their third, because half of their third is gone, too.

But later in the same meeting, Trump referred to both of those conflicts as “two big wars”:

REPORTER: Is there a time frame in your mind?

TRUMP: I mean, it happens quickly. The problem is, every time I mention a timeframe — for instance, I see — you know, we’ve been doing this for a few months. Vietnam lasted 19 years. Korea lasted eight years. Afghanistan lasted many years. They were all many, many years, and we’re into it for a few months.

And I read about people like you. “What’s taking so long?” But we’re in it. You know, we lost between two wars, two big wars, Venezuela and Iran. We lost 13 souls, 13 great people. Met the parents. Great people. And it’s a terrible thing.

Dale singled out both of those moments in a fact check that he said was “not intended as a comprehensive list,” and added that “CNN is still looking into some of the president’s remarks at the meeting.”

He wrote:

Iran’s military capabilities: Trump, speaking of Iran’s military capabilities, said, “Their navy is gone, their air force is gone, everything’s gone.” Though there’s no doubt the US and Israel have significantly degraded Iran’s military capabilities during the war that began in late February, it’s not true that “everything” is gone — as Trump implicitly acknowledged last week when he said, “They have a little ability. Their missiles are 82% gone, we estimate. … Same thing with drones, they’re largely gone but they still have a little capacity.” CNN reported in April that, according to three sources familiar with US intelligence findings, roughly half of Iran’s missile launchers were still intact and thousands of one-way attack drones remained in Iran’s arsenal; CNN reported last week that four sources said US intelligence indicates Iran’s military is reconstituting much faster than initially estimated and that “Iran also still maintains ballistic-missile, drone-attack and anti-air capability despite the serious damage inflicted by US-Israeli strikes, according to recent US intelligence assessments, meaning the quick rebuilding of military production capacity isn’t starting from scratch.”

How Trump describes the war with Iran: Mixing up Iran with Venezuela, Trump spoke about how Americans’ 401(k) balances are high “despite the conflict — I don’t call it a war, I call it a conflict — despite the conflict with Venezuela.” (His subsequent comments made clear he was referring to Iran.) Though Trump has indeed sometimes called the war with Iran a “conflict,” or used other words like “excursion” or “skirmish,” it’s not true that he doesn’t call it a “war.” He has repeatedly called it a war in recent weeks even as he has intermittently insisted he doesn’t use that term; in fact, he called it a war later in this very same Cabinet meeting, noting that the US lost 13 servicemembers “between two wars, two big wars, Venezuela and Iran.”

Dale went on to dissect another half-dozen claims from the Cabinet meeting. Read the full fact check here.

Watch above via White House Pool.

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