WASHINGTON – The first half of President Donald Trump’s NBC News town hall was dominated by testy exchanges with “Today” anchor Savannah Guthrie after she pushed him on a variety of issues.
Under the intense questioning Thursday, Trump told Guthrie “we should be on the same side.”
Guthrie pressed Trump to say when he last tested negative for the coronavirus before his positive diagnosis earlier this month. He did not say.
She pressed him on his prolific tweeting, telling him he’s not someone’s “crazy uncle” who can tweet whatever they want. The moment came after Guthrie asked him about a false conspiracy theory regarding Osama bin Laden.
“You retweeted to your 87 million followers a conspiracy theory that Joe Biden orchestrated to have SEAL Team 6, the Navy SEAL Team 6, killed to cover up the fake death of bin Laden,” Guthrie said. “Now why would you send a lie like that to your followers?”
Trump replied, “That was a retweet, that was an opinion of somebody … I’ll put it out there, people can decide for themselves.”
“I don’t get that,” Guthrie replied. “You’re the president, you’re not like someone’s crazy uncle who can just retweet whatever.”
Guthrie also challenged Trump on his dubious claims about mask-wearing, telling the president that his own government experts are “all in unison” on their benefits.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.