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Snopes.com is sometimes derided by conservatives as a liberal news operation disguised as a fact-checking site.

But this month, Snopes put out a report favorable to President Trump, concluding that, yes, he is the victim of lies in the news and in social media. In a way, the report bolsters Mr. Trumps Twitter rants against fake news.

Snopes writes about a major strand of falsehood about the president that feeds into his persona as a bumbling fool, prone to accidents and devoid of any cultural sophistication.

The Snopes report generally shies away from criticizing the established news media the liberal New York Times-CNN-Washington Post-led anti-Trump reporting that the president castigates the most.

In fact, none of those three is mentioned by Snopes, even though former FBI director James B. Comey told the Senate Intelligence Committee that many, many stories on the Trump-Russia probe are dead wrong.

Trump supporters say the motive for Mr. Comeys conclusion is obvious: The mainstream media is trying to destroy the Trump presidency.

Snopes headlined its article, The Lies of Donald Trumps Critics, and How They Shape His Many Personas.

This article is intended as a neutral, reliable analysis of the lies, false allegations and misleading claims made about and against Donald Trump since his inauguration in January 2017, Snopes explains. Weve attempted to strip away the hyperbole, name-calling and generalizations, and examine the patterns and trends at work: what characterizes these lies and exaggerations, the effect they have, what might explain them.

Snopes does mention a few mainstream media errors, such as Politico reporting that the president signed a kids hat at the White House Easter egg roll but then carelessly tossed it to the crowd. Video showed he tossed it directly to the owner.

Also cited is a Newsweek report that Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi evaded Mr. Trumps notorious bone-crunching power handshake by hugging the president instead. Missing from the account, said Snopes, is the fact that hugging is how Mr. Modi likes to greet fellow world leaders.

Snopes did not cite other, more serious mainstream media errors, such as Times report that Mr. Trump removed the bust of Martin Luther King form the Oval Office when he had not.

Or the BBC reporting that Mr. Trump snubbed Italys prime minister by not wearing an English-translation headset, when in fact he did listen via an earpiece.

Or The New York Times report in February that said Trump aides and senior Russian intelligence officials had repeated contacts in the year leading up to the election. Mr. Trumps team denies this, as did a more neutral source Mr. Comey.

Sen. Tom Cotton, Arkansas Republican, asked Mr. Comey: Would it be fair to characterize that story as almost entirely wrong?

Yes, Mr. Comey said.

It would be virtually impossible for Snopes to cover all the inaccurate anti-Trump stories, as listed by conservative news sites.

Another egregious story, according to Snopes, was a report that the Trump White House took down all references to climate change and LGBTQ rights from its website, when in fact it was simply transitioning from the Barack Obama home page to the Donald Trump WhiteHouse.gov.

Another major strand of falsehood about the President is the one that feeds into his persona as a bumbling fool, prone to accidents and devoid of any cultural sophistication, Snopes said.

In March, Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny came to the White House for the yearly St. Patricks Day White House visit. Recognizing Americas long friendship with Ireland, Mr. Trump read what he said was one of his favorite proverbs: Always remember to forget the friends that proved untrue, but never forget to remember those that have stuck by you.

The press immediately pounced, saying the president cited as an Irish proverb words written by a Nigerian poet.

Snopes said Mr. Trump never identified the words as coming from Ireland. The president used it to support his lead-in: As we stand together with our Irish friends

The entire episode is a remarkable example of something bordering on collective hallucination, most likely brought on by confirmation bias, the Snopes article said. Here hundreds of thousands of people including professional journalists working for influential news organizations, and a chat show host with more than three million nightly viewers [Stephen Colbert] literally heard Trump say something he never said, in most cases probably because it confirmed a pre-existing image of the President as a poorly read, culturally ignorant buffoon.

The article was written by Dan MacGuill, whom Snopes describes as a journalist and fact-checker from Dublin, Ireland.

Conservatives took to Twitter to express pleasant surprise that Snopes would devote any space to debunking anti-Trump stories.

This is really surprising and unexpected from Snopes, said Ashley Rae, AKA @Communism_Kills.

Go here to read the rest:
Snopes publishes favorable Trump report - Washington Times

"State visits are different from a normal visit and at a time when the President of the USA has policies that many in our country disagree with, I am not sure it is appropriate for our government to roll out the red carpet," Khan told CNN in an interview Monday.

The delay comes amid concern that there will be mass protests against Trump in the British capital.

Trump met with UK Prime Minister Theresa May at the G20 summit in Hamburg and told reporters he would be visiting London.

May's offer of a state visit, which typically includes a banquet with the Queen, was made during her visit to Washington in January, just days after Trump's inauguration.

Khan, the first Muslim mayor of a western capital city, did not, however, rule out meeting with the US President, if offered the chance.

"If someone has views that I think can be changed I am ready to play my role," he told CNN.

"If you somehow think it is not possible to be a Muslim and a proud westerner I am happy to disabuse you of that idea, whether you are a reporter for CNN or Donald Trump."

CNN has reached out to the White House for comment.

Khan and Trump's relationship got off to a famously bumpy start over Khan's opposition to Trump's decision to bar from the US people from a list of mainly Muslim countries.

Then, after a terror attack on London Bridge last month that left eight people dead, Khan's reassurance to Londoners that there was "no reason to be alarmed" by the increased police presence drew an extraordinary rebuke from Trump on Twitter.

"At least 7 dead and 48 wounded in terror attack and Mayor of London says there is 'no reason to be alarmed!'" Trump tweeted.

Khan responded by saying his remarks had been taken out of context because he had been referring to the enhanced police presence.

But Trump then tweeted: "Pathetic excuse by London Mayor Sadiq Khan who had to think fast on his 'no reason to be alarmed' statement. MSM [mainstream media] is working hard to sell it!"

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No red carpet for Trump, says London's Khan - CNN International

"HillaryClinton can illegally get the questions to the Debate & delete 33,000 emails but my son Don is being scorned by the Fake News Media?" Trump wrote. The President's latest tweet on the matter comes as questions continue to swirl about the June 2016 meeting, which included at least eight people, including Trump Jr., Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, then-campaign manager Paul Manafort and the Russian lawyer, sources familiar with the meeting told CNN. Trump Jr. took the meeting on the premise that he would get information from the lawyer that would be damaging to Clinton's campaign, according to emails Trump Jr. posted on Twitter last week.

The meeting has put fresh scrutiny on the actions of Trump's family and campaign officials as federal investigators probe whether the campaign colluded with Russians in Moscow's attempt to influence the 2016 election in Trump's favor.

The President also commended ex-campaign adviser Michael Caputo for publicly denying knowledge of any alleged contacts between the campaign and Russia after testifying privately to the House intelligence committee Friday.

"I spent my time in front of the committee detailing the fact that I had no contact with Russians, that I never heard of anyone with the Trump campaign talking with Russians, that I was never asked questions about my time in Russia, that I never even spoke to anyone about Russia, that I never heard the word 'Russia,' and we did not use Russian dressing," Caputo told reporters. "There was absolutely no discussion of Russia on the Trump campaign 'til the day I left."

Caputo resigned from the campaign on June 20, 2016 after celebrating the dismissal of then-campaign manager Corey Lewandowski with a tweet that said, "Ding Dong the witch is dead." Manafort replaced Lewandowski as chairman.

Trump also continued his broadside of the news media in his Sunday morning tweets, claiming without providing evidence that news agencies use phony unnamed sources in their stories.

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Trump defends Donald Trump Jr. in Sunday morning tweetstorm - CNN

President Trump questioned the accuracy of a new poll that shows him having the lowest approval rating of any modern president during the first six months of his term.

But Trump's Sunday tweet about the accuracy of the ABC News/Washington Post poll is questionable when the data is actually examined.

The same poll showed Hillary Clinton narrowly leading Donald Trump 47% to 43% on Nov. 7 2016 one day before the election. It was a national poll that was assessing the overall popular vote, not the victory margins in individual states. And although Clinton lost the electoral vote, she did ultimately win the popular vote 48.2% to 46.1%. That means the poll was one point off for Clinton and three points off for Trump slightly outside of the poll's 2.5 margin of error for the latter, but only by half a point.

Other polls had similar results. The NBC/WSJ poll released on Nov. 6, 2016 also had Clinton leading Trump by 4 points, 44% to 40% the final results fell outside the poll's 2.73 margin of error on both sides. The final pre-election poll conducted by CBS News/New York Times, released on Nov. 3, 2016, like the others, had Clinton leading Trump among likely voters 45% to 42%.

In fact, out of the 21 general election polls showcased by the website RealClearPolitics website on Nov. 7, 2016, only two the LA Times/USC tracking poll and the IBD/TIPP tracking poll had Trump winning the general election. The state polls listed on that website were more inaccurate, with several incorrectly predicting, for example, that Clinton would win states like Florida, Michigan and New Hampshire.

The ABC News/Washington Post poll also detected a loss in voter enthusiasm for Clinton following then-FBI Director James Comey's decision to reopen the probe into her emails in mid-October a factor Clinton has said contributed to her loss. "The change in strong enthusiasm for Clinton is not statistically significant and could reflect night-to-night variability. Still, it bears watching," the poll analysis stated on Oct. 31.

Overall, the ABC News/Washington Post poll certainly did not predict Trump's victory. But it also was more correct than the President let on in his tweet about assessing the ultimate outcome of the popular vote.

The tweet was one of several Trump sent Sunday.

He also said the"fake news" media was "distorting democracy" and brought up the revelation from WikiLeaks that Donna Brazile passed along a question from a CNN primary debate to Hillary Clinton campaign associates, claiming there was a discrepancy in coverage between this incident and Donald Trump Jr.'s meeting with a Russian lawyer.

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President Trump Just Said This Poll Was the 'Most Inaccurate' Around the Election. It Wasn't - TIME

Fueled by antipathy toward President Donald Trump and high expectations about their partys fortunes in the 2018 midterms, Democrats are lining up to run for House seats, creating crowded primary fields in some of the most competitive races in the country.

In California last week, Vietnam-era veteran Paul Kerr, who has never run for political office, jumped into the race to take on nine-term GOP Rep. Darrell Issa the richest member of Congress. Kerr, a real estate investor and a Navy veteran, is the third challenger to date seeking to defeat Issa, the high-profile former chairman of the House Oversight Committee, who barely survived a 2016 challenge.

Story Continued Below

Issa is considered the most vulnerable of seven California GOP House members representing districts that voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016. But his colleagues have even more contenders to worry about.

Eight challengers have lined up to take on Central Valley Republican Jeff Denham. An equal number have jumped into the fray against embattled San Diego-area Rep. Duncan Hunter, the focus of a Justice Department criminal investigation regarding his alleged use of campaign funds to pay for family expenses.

Controversial Rep. Dana Rohrabacher of Huntington Beach, recently in the headlines for his own dealings with Russia, has seven Democrats contesting his reelection. Rep. Steve Knight of Palmdale has six.

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A coast away in New Jersey, Democrats sometimes hard-pressed to find candidates willing to take on entrenched Republican incumbents also have a glut of willing challengers this year in two of the state's five Republican-held districts. Those districts, which include many New York City bedroom communities, are wealthy and well-educated. Clinton narrowly won the Central Jersey-based 7th District, while Trump won the North Jersey-based 11th by a slim margin.

Its 100 percent a testament to the grass-roots energy thats showed up at town halls and events across the country, said Drew Godinich, a spokesman for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, which is pounding out press releases highlighting vulnerable GOP incumbents. In 2018, the big difference is not only the number its the quality of these challengers, he said. Trump is obviously a part of it and so is health care.

Democratic strategist Garry South, who advised presidential campaigns for Al Gore and Joe Lieberman, said the enthusiasm is especially revved-up because Democrats need only 24 seats nationally to flip to get control of the House and more than a quarter of those may be in California.

History is on their side, he argues: Over the past 20 cycles in the first term of a presidency, Republican or Democratic, the average number flipped has been 23 seats.

In New Jersey, Mike DuHaime, a veteran Republican strategist who helped lead both of Gov. Chris Christies successful gubernatorial campaigns as well as his unsuccessful presidential campaign, acknowledges the GOP has some tough work ahead.

It feels very much the reverse of what 2010 was on the Republican side, said DuHaime, whos been hired by GOP Rep. Rodney Frelinghuysen. There was just an energy on the Republican side after President Obama got elected, and I feel the same energy now on the left.

Frelinghuysen has for 24 years been the epitome of a safe incumbent. With ancestral roots in state politics that stretch to the colonial era a New Jersey town is named after the familys progenitor, and a Newark thoroughfare bears the family name Frelinghuysen has not faced a serious electoral challenge in his entire congressional tenure.

In fact, when liberal filmmaker Michael Moore in 2000 sought to demonstrate the lack of competitive congressional seats, he looked to Frelinghuysens district. The filmmaker unsuccessfully tried to get a ficus tree on the ballot against the congressman, who is an heir to the Procter & Gamble fortune and chairman of the powerful House Appropriations Committee.

But now constituents are holding protests at Frelinghuysens office, some organized by a grass-roots group called NJ 11th for Change. Theyre clamoring for him to hold a town hall meeting, which he has refused to do.

Its a similar story in the Central Jersey-based 7th. Democrats say theyre surprised at just how many Democrats want a shot at GOP Rep. Leonard Lance.

Joey Novick, a progressive activist who lives in the district, organized a candidate forum in which five candidates or potential candidates showed up. Novick said he hadnt heard about anyone seeking to challenge Lance at this point in 2015.

That is sort of the interesting magic about this year, he said.

Three Democratic candidates have already declared bank executive Linda Weber, teacher Lisa Mandelblatt and attorney Scott Salmon. And at least four other people are exploring a run, including social worker Peter Jacob, who ran against Lance in 2016 and got 43 percent of the vote.

Nobody took this district seriously. We showed up. Our campaign showed up. We knew what was at stake in 2016, Jacob said. People have realized theres blood in the water now. Thats the phrase everybody is using.

South said GOP candidates across the country now find themselves hobbled by a horribly unpopular GOP president whose approval ratings are in the 30s, and a demoralized GOP base. And midterms are always a referendum on who controls the White House.

Even so, conservative author Jim Lacy, a Trump delegate to the Republican National Convention from California, said Democrats even in solidly blue California shouldnt get too cocky about their chances. He contends that the crowded Democratic primaries are a good thing for Republicans, because Democrats will train their fire on each other, leaving the eventual nominees bloodied and bruised going into the fall general election.

Democratic Party politics are just as cutthroat, if not more, than the Republicans in the state recently, Lacy said.

More primary candidates also increase the likelihood that simmering intraparty divisions between progressives and moderates will spill into the open.

The more challengers, the greater the chance the wrong challenger advances to the general, said Bill Whalen, a Hoover Institution fellow and a former aide to former California GOP Gov. Pete Wilson. Youre talking about a bunch of people competing for 40 percent of the vote. So it raises the chance youll end up with a 'Chelsea Handler' Democrat, his description of someone whos too liberal or unsuited to the local electorate.

All politics are local, especially in House races and Democrats have been learning this in special elections, Whalen said. Its not about having someone running against Donald Trump as it is having someone whos the right local fit. You have to tailor the candidate to the district.

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Trump triggers flood of Democratic candidates - Politico