Trump goes after WaPo reporter for misleading tweet

President TrumpDonald John TrumpHouse Democrat slams Donald Trump Jr. for ‘serious case of amnesia’ after testimony Skier Lindsey Vonn: I don’t want to represent Trump at Olympics Poll: 4 in 10 Republicans think senior Trump advisers had improper dealings with Russia MORE blasted a Washington Post reporter on Saturday, accusing him of posting a misleading photo showing a mostly-empty venue ahead of the president’s Friday rally in Pensacola, Fla.

“@DaveWeigel @WashingtonPost put out a phony photo of an empty arena hours before I arrived @ the venue, w/ thousands of people outside, on their way in. Real photos now shown as I spoke,” Trump tweeted. “Packed house, many people unable to get in. Demand apology retraction from FAKE NEWS WaPo!”

.@DaveWeigel @WashingtonPost put out a phony photo of an empty arena hours before I arrived @ the venue, w/ thousands of people outside, on their way in. Real photos now shown as I spoke. Packed house, many people unable to get in. Demand apology retraction from FAKE NEWS WaPo! pic.twitter.com/XAblFGh1ob

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 9, 2017

Dave Weigel, a political reporter for the Post, responded to the president’s tweet within minutes, pointing out that David Martosko, the Daily Mail’s U.S. politics editor, had told him he had “gotten it wrong” and noting that he had deleted the initial tweet.

He apologized for the mistake.

“Sure thing: I apologize. I deleted the photo after @dmartosko told me I’d gotten it wrong. Was confused by the image of you walking in the bottom right corner,” Weigel wrote on Twitter.

Sure thing: I apologize. I deleted the photo after @dmartosko told me I’d gotten it wrong. Was confused by the image of you walking in the bottom right corner. https://t.co/fQY7GMNSaD

— Dave Weigel (@daveweigel) December 9, 2017

Weigel also noted that the initial tweet was posted from his personal Twitter account, rather than an official Washington Post account, adding that it was “very fair to call” him out.

It was a bad tweet on my personal account, not a story for Washington Post. I deleted it after like 20 minutes. Very fair to call me out.

Everything I say on Twitter is a joke, except what I say about @swin24. https://t.co/tI7SQnpoN9

— Dave Weigel (@daveweigel) December 9, 2017

 Trump responded to Weigel’s apology by calling for his firing.

“.@daveweigel of the Washington Post just admitted that his picture was a FAKE (fraud?) showing an almost empty arena last night for my speech in Pensacola when, in fact, he knew the arena was packed (as shown also on T.V.). FAKE NEWS, he should be fired,” Trump tweeted.

.@daveweigel of the Washington Post just admitted that his picture was a FAKE (fraud?) showing an almost empty arena last night for my speech in Pensacola when, in fact, he knew the arena was packed (as shown also on T.V.). FAKE NEWS, he should be fired.

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 9, 2017

Trump’s tweet targeting Weigel was his most recent in a string of Twitter attacks on news organizations and reporters on Saturday. 

Earlier in the day, he hit ABC News reporter Brian Ross for an erroneous report aired last week claiming that Trump had instructed Michael Flynn, his first national security adviser, to make contact with Russians before the 2016 election.

After receiving widespread criticism, ABC News issued a “clarification” for that report, saying that Flynn was not directed to make contact until after the election. The network later issued a full “correction,” and Ross was suspended for four weeks without pay.

Also on Saturday, Trump turned his ire to CNN, accusing the network of making a “vicious and purposeful mistake” in a report published Friday. That report said that the Trump campaign had been given early access to hacked WikiLeaks documents on Sept. 4, 2016.

The network later issued a correction to that report, noting that the campaign was given access to the documents on Sept. 14, after WikiLeaks had made the documents public.

Updated at 5:30 p.m. 

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South Korea to Impose New Sanctions on Pyongyang

South Korea will impose new unilateral sanctions against nuclear-armed Pyongyang, a report said Sunday, in Seoul’s latest effort to pressure the North after a series of weapons tests that have sent regional tensions surging.

The move comes after a rare visit to North Korea by a senior U.N. official, who called for dialogue between Pyongyang and the international community to avert a potentially catastrophic “miscalculation” in the high-stakes nuclear crisis.

Seoul’s new measures, its second set of unilateral sanctions in a month, are likely to draw an angry response from Pyongyang, which views its neighbor as overly dependent on a hostile Washington.

A total of 20 North Korean organizations, including banks and trading companies, and 12 North Korean individuals — mostly bankers — will be blacklisted as of Monday, the South’s Yonhap news agency reported citing a foreign ministry official.

“The organizations and individuals were involved in supplying money needed to develop weapons of mass destruction or illegal trading of sanctioned items,” the official said, according to Yonhap.

The measures are in addition to those by the U.N. Security Council, which has hit the isolated and impoverished North with a package of sanctions over its increasingly powerful missile and nuclear tests.

China, Pyongyang’s sole major diplomatic and military ally, has also backed the U.N. embargoes, but has repeatedly pushed for talks to diffuse tensions.

The U.N.’s under secretary general Jeffrey Feltman visited the North just a week after Pyongyang said it test-fired a new ballistic missile capable of reaching the United States.

His trip also coincided with the U.S. and South Korea’s biggest-ever joint air exercise, which the North slammed as a provocation and revealing an intention to “mount a surprise nuclear pre-emptive strike”.

Seoul’s sanctions will bar South Korean individuals and entities from transacting with those on the list, but it will be largely symbolic given a lack of inter-Korean economic ties.

Last year, South Korea unilaterally closed operations at the jointly-run Kaesong Industrial Complex, saying cash from the zone was being funnelled to the North’s weapons program.

The complex was the last remaining form of North-South economic cooperation. Seoul banned nearly all business with the North in 2010 after accusing Pyongyang of sinking one of its warships.

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This article was from Agence France Presse and was legally licensed through the NewsCred publisher network. Please direct all licensing questions to legal@newscred.com.

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