White House Demands Retraction of Report That Trump Fears Journalists Will Try to Give Him Coronavirus

Aidan McLaughlinMar 9th, 2020, 5:30 pm
 

White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham demanded a retraction Monday of a Vanity Fair report detailing President Donald Trump’s panicked response to coronavirus.

The story, by Gabriel Sherman, reported that Trump is “melting down” over his inability to control the crisis and media coverage of it. While the president downplays the severity of the coronavirus spread in public, he’s “privately terrified” of it in public, Sherman reported, and is furious by “double dippers.” “He hates it if someone is eating nachos and dips a chip back in after taking a bite,” Sherman wrote.

Trump even told aides, per a source in the report, that “he’s afraid journalists will try to purposefully contract coronavirus to give it to him on Air Force One.”

“This is 100% fake news,” Grisham tweeted in response to the story. She claimed Sherman “did not reach out” to her for comment on his piece.

“False & sensational writing on this topic is irresponsible,” she continued, before demanding a retraction: “POTUS has spent plenty of time w the press pool – simply ask ur colleagues. Nothing about your little college essay is funny or true & I want a retraction.”

Sherman did not respond to a request for comment on Grisham’s tweet.

Team Trump, of course, doesn’t have the best track record in taking on the media, and the demand for a retraction can be taken with a grain of salt. Trump’s campaign recently announced a slew of libel lawsuits against major media organizations, including CNN, the Washington Post and the New York Times. They are all almost certain to fail.

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Aidan McLaughlin - Editor in Chief

Aidan McLaughlin is the Editor in Chief of Mediaite. Send tips via email: aidan@mediaite.com. Ask for Signal. Follow him on Twitter: @aidnmclaughlin