President Donald Trump consistently refuses to tie his rhetoric to reality. If he can come up with it, then he appears completely willing to just throw it out and see if it sticks. Last week at a rally in Battle Creek, Michigan, in one of his latest bizarre, frenzied outbursts against progressive energy sources, he claimed that one of the reasons that fluorescent, energy efficient light bulbs are supposedly bad is that residents have to travel “hundreds of miles” to dispose of them. That’s simply not true. Via city-sponsored collection events and even a local Home Depot, Battle Creek residents have easy, close access to bulb disposal methods.
CNN’s fact-checker Daniel Dale noted as much on Twitter, writing:
‘Trump told supporters in Battle Creek, MI that if their fluorescent bulbs break, they have to go to a dump “a couple of hundred miles away” to dispose them. The city tells me they actually have two annual collection events in Battle Creek, two in the county seat 11 miles away.’
Trump told supporters in Battle Creek, MI that if their fluorescent bulbs break, they have to go to a dump "a couple of hundred miles away" to dispose them.
The city tells me they actually have two annual collection events in Battle Creek, two in the county seat 11 miles away.
— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) December 27, 2019
There’s obviously a large difference between having to travel, uh, hundreds of miles and having to take a ten to twenty minute drive. Yet, it’s hardly the only gross exaggeration-fueled lie that Trump offered at that Michigan rally. While speaking, he also apparently claimed that there were some twenty thousand people outside the venue who were unable to get in because it was so packed, but Dale adds that city authorities estimated that the crowd actually numbered around a thousand — just one thousand.
Trump said at his Battle Creek rally that there were 20,000 supporters stuck outside unable to get in because the 5,400-capacity arena was full.
The city of Battle Creek tells me that they made a rough estimate of 1,000 people unable to get in.
— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) December 27, 2019
It’s not the first time that Trump has freely and outlandishly inflated his rally crowd size numbers — and neither is it the first time that he’s ranted and raved against energy efficiency. Just recently, at a Florida summit of the conservative student organization Turning Point USA, he went on a dramatic tirade against wind power, including his remark that he’s, uh, “never understood wind.”
He continued:
‘I know windmills very much, I have studied it better than anybody. I know it is very expensive. They are made in China and Germany mostly, very few made here, almost none, but they are manufactured, tremendous — if you are into this — tremendous fumes and gases are spewing into the atmosphere. You know we have a world, right? So the world is tiny compared to the universe. So tremendous, tremendous amount of fumes and everything. You talk about the carbon footprint, fumes are spewing into the air, right spewing, whether it is China or Germany, is going into the air.’
In other words — beware, windmills are polluting the galaxy! Or something. Remember, this is the president of the United States talking.
On Twitter this week, Trump claimed that impeachment proceedings (and by extension, other investigations into his behavior) “make it much more difficult to deal with foreign leaders (and others),” but he’s become a global laughingstock all on his own. He’s the one who made the crowd at the United Nations laugh at him when he claimed that he’s done more than almost any other U.S. president — not Nancy Pelosi!
Despite all of the great success that our Country has had over the last 3 years, it makes it much more difficult to deal with foreign leaders (and others) when I am having to constantly defend myself against the Do Nothing Democrats & their bogus Impeachment Scam. Bad for USA!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 26, 2019
