Trump Refutes ‘Anonymous Sources’ Who Claim He Denigrated Fallen Soldiers

Late Thursday night, a terribly disturbing story came to light.

The tale came to us from The Atlantic, who cited a number of anonymous sources, and suggested that President Donald Trump had made horrid and disparaging remarks regarding US Marines who fought and died at the battle of Belleau Wood.

When President Donald Trump canceled a visit to the Aisne-Marne American Cemetery near Paris in 2018, he blamed rain for the last-minute decision, saying that “the helicopter couldn’t fly” and that the Secret Service wouldn’t drive him there. Neither claim was true.

Trump rejected the idea of the visit because he feared his hair would become disheveled in the rain, and because he did not believe it important to honor American war dead, according to four people with firsthand knowledge of the discussion that day. In a conversation with senior staff members on the morning of the scheduled visit, Trump said, “Why should I go to that cemetery? It’s filled with losers.” In a separate conversation on the same trip, Trump referred to the more than 1,800 marines who lost their lives at Belleau Wood as “suckers” for getting killed.

And while the reporting here is damning, President Trump has roundly rejected the story as absolutely false.

Trump lashed out at The Atlantic’s report just hours after its publication, saying there is “nobody that respects” members of the military more than he does and calling the article “a disgraceful attempt to influence the 2020 election.”

Trump delivered a seven-minute rebuttal on the steps of Air Force One on his return from an evening campaign rally in Latrobe, Pa., according to a pool report, followed by multiple tweets.

The story will likely be utilized in an enormous number of anti-Trump campaign ads in the coming days despite the President’s vehement denial.