President Barack Obama wanted to personally set the record straight on Sunday after Donald Trump falsely accused the president of yelling at a protester days earlier.
“The point is, he thought it was OK to just lie,” Obama said at a campaign rally for Hillary Clinton in Kissimmee, Florida. “Wasn’t even trying to be sneaky about it. That says something about how unacceptable behavior has become normal.”
Media organizations quickly called Trump out for, as one CNN headline put it, the “wild misrepresentation,” and PolitiFact gave Trump a “pants on fire." But Obama clearly wanted to set the record straight himself, saying Trump “just made it up.”
“Didn’t just make it up,” Obama continued, “but said the exact opposite of what happened, with impunity.”
Obama took the contrast a step further after the event. He met with J.J. Holmes, a 12-year-old boy with cerebral palsy who was removed from a Trump rally in Tampa on Saturday. Holmes was protesting Trump for mocking people with disabilities, and the crowd starting pushing against his wheelchair, according to the boy’s mother.
It was Obama’s fourth campaign event in Florida in just 10 days, so he was clearly looking for fresh fodder to go after Trump. He seized on a nugget from a report in The New York Times that the Republican candidate’s staff had to take control of the candidate’s Twitter account in the campaign’s waning days.
“Apparently his campaign has taken his Twitter,” Obama told the crowd at Osceola County Stadium. “In the last two days, they had so little confidence in his self control, they said we’re just gonna take away your Twitter. Now, if somebody can’t handle a Twitter account, they can’t handle the nuclear codes."
Another news item broke during Obama’s remarks: that the FBI won’t be recommending charges against Clinton or her aides based on the new trove of emails found on Anthony Weiner’s computer. In that sense, this Orlando swing was a closing of the circle, of sorts, for Obama: news of Comey’s letter to Congress about the new evidence emerged just before Obama flew to Orlando to stump for Clinton on Oct. 28. He hasn’t brought up the emails at any of the rallies since then.
Obama was in the Orlando area in part to help drive Puerto Rican turnout in a state that has already seen especially high early voting numbers among Hispanics — he made sure to remind the crowd about his nomination of Justice Sonia Sotomayor, of Puerto Rican heritage. His message, boosting both Clinton and Rep. Patrick Murphy’s bid against Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), is becoming increasingly familiar. He was in Orlando just eight days ago, and over the past week, he’s also campaigned in Miami and Jacksonville.
According to a count by CBS’ Mark Knoller, Sunday marked Obama’s 14th rally for Clinton. On Monday, he’s slated to head to Michigan, New Hampshire and Pennsylvania.
