Trump Refuses To Believe Fox News Reporter Who Tells Him Protests Are Expanding Across the Country: ‘I Don’t Think So’

President Donald Trump rejected the premise of a Fox News reporter’s question about protests in more than a dozen cities, telling her, “I don’t think so.”

The president and First Lady Melania Trump were at the Kennedy Center on Wednesday night to see a performance of “Les Misérables.” Their theatre night comes just days after the president deployed more than 4,000 soldiers to Los Angeles to quell ongoing protests that began on Friday, when demonstrators gathered to protest immigration raids in the city.

It is the first time a president has federalized a state’s National Guard over the objection of its governor since 1965. That rare act has spawned protests in other major cities, including New York and Chicago.

Before the play, Trump took questions from a throng of reporters outside, where Fox News Correspondent Gillian Turner asked about the demonstrations. Trump responded by telling her he flat-out didn’t believe her:

TURNER: Mr. President, if this turns into another summer of unrest, what are you prepared to do, sir?

TRUMP: About what?

TURNER: If this turns– well, the protests have spread now to 16 cities across the U.S. If this turns–

TRUMP: Well, that’s what you’re saying. Do I believe you? I don’t think so.

TURNER: Well, I got that from the Fox News brain room.

TRUMP: I can tell you, what we have, what we have a situation in Los Angeles that was caused by gross incompetence. They didn’t have the police to handle it.

The president went on to falsely claim the police asked him to deploy the guard.

California has sued the administration, arguing it lacks the authority to deploy troops under the law that Trump officials invoked.

“This brazen abuse of power by a sitting president inflamed a combustible situation, putting our people, our officers, and even our National Guard at risk,” Governor Gavin Newsom said in a primetime address on Tuesday.

Watch above via Fox News.