In a Wall Street Journal interview this week, Trump claimed that the head of the Boy Scouts called him to heap praise on the politically aggressive speech Trump delivered at the Scouts’ national jamboree last week.
“I got a call from the head of the Boy Scouts saying it was the greatest speech that was ever made to them,” Trump said.
At that point, all but the blindest of Trump supporters already knew he was lying.
The Boy Scouts confirmed these suspicions. “We are unaware of any such call,” the Boy Scouts responded in a statement. They went on to specify that neither Boy Scout President Randall Stephenson nor Chief Scout Executive Mike Surbaugh placed such a call.
Faced with this unequivocal denial, White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders confirmed that no phone call had taken place but said “multiple members of the Boy Scout leadership” approached Trump in person after the speech and “offered quite powerful compliments.”
Sanders explained the discrepancy Wednesday by saying Trump misspoke when he described the conversations as calls.
“The conversations took place,” she said. “They just simply didn’t take place over a phone call.”
In other words, he lied the first time. And he probably lied about the “quite powerful compliments” about “the greatest speech ever,” too, considering the Boy Scouts apologized for subjecting the boys to his bizarre tirade.
No, he definitely lied about that, too. He lies. He lies and lies and lies.
Even worse, his lies are so sad. He’s lying about nonexistent compliments. He’s lying in the hopes that people will like him more. He’s lying because there is obviously something broken or missing inside of him that requires him to invent these self-serving statements.
He did the same thing later that day when he claimed to have received a call from Mexican President Peña Nieto.
“Even the president of Mexico called me. Their southern border, they said very few people are coming because they know they’re not going to get to our border, which is the ultimate compliment.”
Sanders was later forced to admit that the call didn’t happen. Her explanation:
Trump was actually referring to an in-person chat with the Mexican president last month at the Group 20 Summit in Hamburg even though Trump implied that the phone just happened.
So he lied. Again. Attempting to praise himself in the process.
We should not be surprised.
As you probably remember, in the 1990’s, Trump would frequently pose as fictional publicist “John Miller” or “John Barron” in order to say flattering things about himself.
More than 25 years later, Trump would name his son Barron. Apparently his fondness for the name did not wane.
Trump publicly acknowledged and apologized for these lies back then but denies it today.
Another lie.
Here’s what I’d like:
I want the media to stop using phrases like “misleading statements” or “false statements” or “corrected statements. I just want them to say,
“Trump lied. The Boy Scouts never called.”
“Trump lied. The Mexican government never called.”
“Trump lied. He admitted to masquerading as a publicist in the 1990’s and now denies it.”
I want them to use the word “lie” when appropriate.
