'Not even close to true': CNN fact-checker takes down Trump's latest outlandish claims
President Donald Trump once again doubled down on his baseless accusations that diversity hiring at air traffic control was responsible for the deadly American Eagle plane crash this week at National Airport in D.C. — despite several ways in which his administration left the Federal Aviation Administration unprepared for securing the skies.
CNN fact-checker Daniel Dale laid into Trump's claims on that, and many more issues the president brought up on Friday.
"First of all, I just have to say he's kind of contradicting himself, at least in what I'm hearing," said anchor Jake Tapper. "He's blaming the accident on lower standards, he says, when it comes to diversity hiring for air traffic controllers, although I don't know any evidence that the standards were lowered, there certainly is an effort for diversity in hiring, and the standards he's talking about were implemented in 2013 and were there throughout his first term and then the Biden term. But beyond that, he's also blaming the pilot of the Blackhawk. So if he's blaming the pilot of the Blackhawk, I'm not really sure why it's the fault of the air traffic controller hiring system."
ALSO READ: 'Driven to self-loathing': Inside the extremist website believed to 'groom' teen attackers
"I'm entirely with you, Jake," agreed Dale. "I think those are very good points."
"Three other quick things from those remarks we heard," he continued. "Number one, again, there is precisely no available evidence right now that anything related to Biden rules and regulations caused this crash. We'll wait and see what the investigation uncovers. Number two, he said, as he has before, that the U.S. was at its richest of all time in the late 1800s, early 1900s, when we had high tariffs. Not even close to true. Per-capita income, for example, is about 10 times today what it was back then."
"And then he referred to fentanyl seizures and migration at the northern border with Canada," said Dale, who is himself Canadian. "Worth pointing out those are a tiny fraction of both fentanyl seizures and migrant encounters at the northern border compared to what they are at the southern border. Just no comparison between Canada and Mexico on those two things."
Watch the video below or at the link here.
Leave a Comment
Related Post