Donald Trump has always lied a lot. It’s getting worse. Hugely worse. The Washington Post has the facts: Trump made 5,000 “false and misleading claims” in his first 601 days in office … and his next 5,000, bringing him to 10,000, in the next 226 days.
That means Trump went from eight false or misleading claims a day to nearly 23—in public. If we knew what he was saying in private the number would doubtlessly be much, much higher. How does Trump rack up the lies so quickly? There’s Twitter, of course. But also:
There was a 45-minute telephone interview with Sean Hannity of Fox News on April 25: 45 claims. There was an eight-minute gaggle with reporters the morning of April 26: eight claims. There was a speech to the National Rifle Association: 24 claims. There was 19-minute interview with radio host Mark Levin: 17 claims. And, finally, there was the campaign rally on April 27: 61 claims.
While the traditional media likes to steer clear of the straightforward “lies” to describe what Trump’s doing, we know that Trump is lying not just because we know something about the quality of the man’s character but because when someone repeats a “false claim” literally dozens of times after it’s been called out as false, it’s a lie: Trump knows what he’s doing and he just keeps at it. There are 21 lies Trump has told 20 or more times, topping out at 160 repetitions of the lie that his border wall is already being built.
His followers eat it up and Republican politicians defend it, showing that this isn’t about Trump alone. His entire party is complicit in his lies.