CNN anchor Brianna Keilar isn’t buying the claim that President Donald Trump’s “friends” were shut-ins in Washington D.C. for years due to crime.
Trump, while speaking in the Oval Office with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Monday, told one of his dubious “sir” stories about an alleged friend of his who told him that he and his wife had been so scared of rampant crime in the nation’s capital that they hadn’t even been out to eat in four whole years.
“Friends are calling me up, Democrats are calling me up, and they’re saying, ‘Sir, I want to thank you. My wife and I went out to dinner last night for the first time in four years, and Washington D.C. is safe. And you did that in four days,’” he claimed.
Keilar was skeptical about this supposed couple’s motivations.
“I mean, quite frankly, if you look at the D.C. crime numbers, that is more indicative of a marital problem than a crime problem,” the CNN News Central anchor said.
Trump also asserted Monday, without providing any evidence, that the capital’s restaurants in “the last two days were busier than they’ve been in a long time.”
Yet reservations have fallen sharply, Keilar noted.
Last Tuesday, the day after Trump announced the deployment of National Guard troops to the district and the federalization of the city’s police department, there were 27 percent fewer online reservations compared to the same date last year, capital-area CBS affiliate WUSA9 first reported, citing data from OpenTable.
The following five days, from Wednesday through Sunday, saw drops of 31 percent, 29 percent, 25 percent, 20 percent and 22 percent.
When asked by the Daily Beast what statistics the president based his claim on about restaurants being busier that normal over the weekend, the White House did not provide any.
“Dozens of D.C. small businesses, restaurants, and local shops have closed their doors due to the violent crime that has plagued the city,” White House Assistant Press Secretary Taylor Rogers instead told the Daily Beast in a statement. “President Trump’s bold leadership will restore our nation’s capital by creating opportunities for businesses to flourish without fear of criminals looting and destroying their property. President Trump is delivering on his promise to make D.C. safer, which will inherently make D.C. more prosperous.”
The White House also did not give a name for the person Trump allegedly spoke with who hadn’t gone out to eat with his wife in four years until recently.
On social media, the White House has bragged about its D.C. crackdown—which included the arrest of a former Department of Justice employee who allegedly threw a sandwich at a Customs and Border Protection officer’s chest.
Violent crime in the city was already at a 30-year low—and down 26 percent from last year—before Trump announced he would be getting the military involved.
