The crowd erupted in cheers Saturday when President Donald Trump mocked the press, saying “it would be so much easier if we had a press that told the truth.”
Trump made the remarks during a wide-ranging speech closing out the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in National Harbor, Maryland.
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Trump began by talking about his decision to pull American troops from Syria and how he believed that the coverage of that decision had been unfair. (RELATED: We Can’t Destroy NATO ‘For The Kurds’: Jim Talent, James Carafano Break Down The Syria Situation)
“You remember recently when I took the soldiers out of Syria and everyone said, ‘well, we have to protect the border between Turkey and Syria’ and I said, ‘why, why, what does it have to do with us? They have been fighting for a thousand years. What does it have to do with us? Why are we protecting the border?'”Trump asked.
The president went on to note that he had kept a presence in Syria because of the oil he wanted to protect, saying that the press had not reported that fairly either. “So they say he left soldiers, no, I left soldiers to keep the oil, okay, they don’t want to say that. ‘He kept soldiers there. He didn’t tell the truth.’ These people are the worst. They are.'”
The crowd laughed as Trump shrugged and continued, “It would be so much easier for our country if we had a press that told the truth.”
The crowd erupted in cheers and laughter.
“Right? It’s true,” the president concluded.