After sticking by false comments that Alabama was in the path of Hurricane Dorian, Donald Trump displayed the National Hurricane Center’s original weather forecast chart for the storm on Wednesday. And an apparent Sharpie edit caught the attention of the internet.
A closer look at the chart Trump displayed, while discussing the impact and response to Dorian, appears that the original forecast cone that mapped the predicted direction of Dorian on Aug. 29 was altered in black ink to touch a corner of — you guessed it — Alabama.
After getting a lot of heat for the lie, Trump decided to double down by tweeting an older map that barely showed the storm hitting Alabama.
He also added, “I accept the Fake News apologies!”
This was the originally projected path of the Hurricane in its early stages. As you can see, almost all models predicted it to go through Florida also hitting Georgia and Alabama. I accept the Fake News apologies! pic.twitter.com/0uCT0Qvyo6 [1]
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 4, 2019 [2]
Twitter had a field day:
This map is from last Wednesday. Trump's Alabama tweet was on Sunday, after all models showed a turn. Also this doesn't explain the Sharpie thing https://t.co/Q2Ba1aFl6t [3]
— Steven Lemongello (@SteveLemongello) September 4, 2019 [4]
For what it's worth, this map is from August 28. Trump's tweet about Alabama came on September 1. https://t.co/nNVQvU6hRH [5]
— Ben Jacobs (@Bencjacobs) September 4, 2019 [6]
Guy spent the entire weekend golfing while a hurricane bore down on America. NOW? He's literally got his entire staff and the National Weather service kludging up graphics to support his childish bullshit.
We should just name every storm Trump, since they're all about him. https://t.co/mVHe2uADcs [7]
— Stonekettle (@Stonekettle) September 4, 2019 [8]
This is hilarious. He's still pretending he can pick Alabama out on a map. https://t.co/rwo7kGaFvN [9]
— Mrs. Betty Bowers (@BettyBowers) September 4, 2019 [10]
This in no way explains why he falsified an official hurricane projection with a sharpie. https://t.co/3uFD5YZ9of [11]
— Laura Bassett (@LEBassett) September 4, 2019 [12]