By Daniel Dale, Holmes Lybrand, Tara Subramaniam and Katelyn Polantz, CNN
Updated 8:31 AM ET, Thu June 4, 2020
Fact-checking Trump’s claims on tear gas used against protesters
Washington (CNN)President Donald Trump and others in his administration have made multiple false, misleading or unsupported claims related to how they have responded to the recent wave of protests.
Trump claimed that Washington, DC, Mayor Muriel Bowser would not allow the local police department to help with the protests, though department officers were actually on the scene.
Trump and others said no tear gas was used, though police acknowledged dispersing protesters using a chemical riot control agent that the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says is sometimes referred to as tear gas.
Trump also claimed that he spent time in a bunker under the White House during the daytime to do an “inspection.” Numerous news outlets, including CNN, The New York Times and Fox News, reported that he was taken to the bunker for security reasons on Friday night.
Trump’s time in a White House bunker
In a Wednesday radio interview with Fox News host Brian Kilmeade, Trump said news reports about how he had been rushed to an underground White House bunker during protests Friday night were “false.”
“I wasn’t down,” Trump said — then said, “I went down during the day,” not during the intense protests at night. He added that “I was there for a tiny, little short period of time,” and that it was “much more for an inspection” than because of an urgent security issue.
He said of the Secret Service: “They said it would be a good time to go down, take a look, because maybe some time you’re going to need it.”
Facts First: Multiple media outlets reported that this is not what happened.
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Article URL : https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/04/politics/fact-check-trump-5-false-claims-response-to-protests/index.html