Explosive Washington Post article that rips the veneer off Trump and shows what a brazen liar Trump truly is. Even under oath. This man has no shame, no morals, no character.
Even under Oath Trump struggled with the truth
The lawyer gave Donald Trump a note, written in Trump’s own handwriting. He asked Trump to read it aloud.
Trump may not have realized it yet, but he had walked into a trap.
“Peter, you’re a real loser,” Trump began reading.
The mogul had sent the note to a reporter, objecting to a story that said Trump owned a “small minority stake” in a Manhattan real estate project. Trump insisted that the word “small” was incorrect. Trump continued reading: “I wrote, ‘Is 50 percent small?’ ”
“This [note] was intended to indicate that you had a 50 percent stake in the project, correct?” said the lawyer.
“That’s correct,” Trump said.
For the first of many times that day, Trump was about to be caught saying something that wasn’t true.
.
LAWYER: Mr. Trump, do you own 30 percent or 50 percent of the limited partnership?
TRUMP: I own 30 percent.
Trump had been incensed by a newspaper article that attacked him, and in typical Trump fashion, unable to let anything slide, he wrote that reporter a note in which he bragged that he owned 50% of a certain real estate project, lied in a fit of self-aggrandization, when indeed he only owned 30% of that project.
It was a mid-December morning in 2007 — the start of an interrogation unlike anything else in the public record of Trump’s life.
Trump had brought it on himself. He had sued a reporter, accusing him of being reckless and dishonest in a book that raised questions about Trump’s net worth. The reporter’s attorneys turned the tables and brought Trump in for a deposition.
For two straight days, they asked Trump question after question that touched on the same theme: Trump’s honesty.
The lawyers confronted the mogul with his past statements — and with his company’s internal documents, which often showed those statements had been incorrect or invented. The lawyers were relentless. Trump, the bigger-than-life mogul, was vulnerable — cornered, out-prepared and under oath.
Thirty times, they caught him.
Trump had misstated sales at his condo buildings. Inflated the price of membership at one of his golf clubs. Overstated the depth of his past debts and the number of his employees.
That deposition — 170 transcribed pages — offers extraordinary insights into Trump’s relationship with the truth. Trump’s falsehoods were unstrategic — needless, highly specific, easy to disprove. When caught, Trump sometimes blamed others for the error or explained that the untrue thing really was true, in his mind, because he saw the situation more positively than others did.
Trump has had a habit of telling demonstrable untruths during his presidential campaign. The Washington Post’s Fact Checker has awarded him four Pinocchios — the maximum a statement can receive — 39 times since he announced his bid last summer. In many cases, his statements echo those in the 2007 deposition: They are specific, checkable — and wrong.
Trump said he opposed the Iraq War at the start. He didn’t. He said he’d never mocked a disabled New York Times reporter. He had. Trump also said the National Football League had sent him a letter, objecting to a presidential debate that was scheduled for the same time as a football game. It hadn’t.
Last week, Trump claimed that he had seen footage — taken at a top-secret location and released by the Iranian government — showing a plane unloading a large amount of cash to Iran from the U.S. government. He hadn’t. Trump later conceded he’d been mistaken — he’d seen TV news video that showed a plane during a prisoner release.
But, even under the spotlight of this campaign, Trump has never had an experience quite like this deposition on Dec. 19 and 20, 2007.
He was trapped in a room — with his own prior statements and three high-powered lawyers.
“A very clear and visible side effect of my lawyers’ questioning of Trump is that he [was revealed as] a routine and habitual fabulist,” said Timothy L. O’Brien, the author Trump had sued.
The lawyer played a clip from Larry King’s talk show, in which King asked Trump how many people worked for him. “Twenty-two thousand or so,” Trump said.
“Are all those people on your payroll?” Ceresney asked him.
“No, not directly,” Trump said. He said he was counting employees of other companies that acted as suppliers and subcontractors to his businesses.
Another one. In O’Brien’s book, Trump had been quoted saying: “I had zero borrowings from [my father’s] estate. . . . I give you my word.”
Under oath:
“Mr. Trump, have you ever borrowed money from your father’s estate?”
“I think a small amount a long time ago,” Trump said. “I think it was like in the $9 million range.”
There is a lot more to this very insightful article, but I would run afoul usage rules here if I quoted more. The article goes into all of the areas he feels compelled to lie through his teeth, including the three big areas:
TRUMP INFLATES THE NUMBERS
TRUMP PASSES THE BLAME
TRUMP MAKES UNSUPPORTED CLAIMS
Please read the article here:
Even under oath, Donald Trump struggled with the truth
It explores and shows that Trump has been a pathological and habitual liar for many years, a man without character and moral fiber. The lying did not just start when Trump decided to run for President, it has always been there. It is part of him. This shameless liar must be stopped.