President Trump’s tweet calling the New York Times the “ENEMY OF THE PEOPLE” brought a blistering response from the Gray Lady’s publisher, who said the phrase “isn’t just false, it’s dangerous.”
Trump set off the dust-up Wednesday morning when he tweeted: “The New York Times reporting is false. They are a true ENEMY OF THE PEOPLE!”
Several hours later, the newspaper’s publisher, A.G. Sulzberger, released a statement condemning Trump’s comment.
“The phrase ‘enemy of the people’ is not just false, it’s dangerous. It has an ugly history of being wielded by dictators and tyrants who sought to control public information,” Sulzberger said in the statement. “And it is particularly reckless coming from someone whose office gives him broad powers to fight or imprison the nation’s enemies.”
Sulzberger also noted that he met with Trump at the White House — once last July and again at the end of January — when the publisher and the president discussed Trump’s abusive treatment of the media.
“As I have repeatedly told President Trump face to face, there are mounting signs that this incendiary rhetoric is encouraging threats and violence against journalists at home and abroad,” Sulzberger said in the statement.
By “demonizing the free press as the enemy,” he wrote, the president is backing away from a “distinctly American principle.”
“It’s a principle that previous occupants of the Oval Office fiercely defended regardless of their politics, party affiliation, or complaints about how they were covered,” Sulzberger said.
He went on to list Trump’s predecessors’ words in support of the need for a free press — a right “enshrined in the First Amendment.”
“Thomas Jefferson declared, ‘The only security of all is in a free press.’ John F. Kennedy warned about the risks to ‘free society without a very, very active press.’ Ronald Reagan said, ‘There is no more essential ingredient than a free, strong and independent press to our continued success,'” Sulzberger said.
He concluded by vowing that the newspaper, as it has over the past 167 years, will continue to “pursue the truth wherever it leads. That will not change.”
In his tweet, Trump didn’t elaborate on why he chose Wednesday to continue his attacks on the Times.
About an hour before, he lashed out at the media in general.
“The Press has never been more dishonest than it is today. Stories are written that have absolutely no basis in fact. The writers don’t even call asking for verification. They are totally out of control,” he posted. “Sadly, I kept many of them in business. In six years, they all go BUST!”
On Wednesday, the Times published an in-depth report outlining the investigations hovering around Trump and how he reacted to them.
Among the revelations, the Times said Trump asked acting Attorney General Matt Whitaker to put the president’s political appointee in charge of the hush-payment investigation involving his former lawyer Michael Cohen.
It also said Trump has publicly attacked special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation more than 1,000 times, based on public statements or tweets since he entered office.