Trump booed by Davos delegates
ECONOMIC FORUM: PRESIDENT GOES OFF-SCRIPT AGAIN
Remarks regarding ‘vicious, nasty, fake press’ backfired.
mean, how vicious and how fake the press can be,” Trump said.
Some of the 1 500 delegates in the packed conference hall booed at those remarks.
The official White House transcript of Trump’s speech recorded the reaction to his remarks on the media merely as “laughter”.
Some attendees had also booed earlier when Schwab, who congratulated Trump for his tax reforms as he introduced the president, said some anti-Trump criticism was based on “biased misinterpretations”.
Speaking to reporters earlier as he arrived at the conference centre in the snowbound Swiss resort, Trump had used characteristic terms to reject a bombshell report in the New York Times.
The newspaper cited four anonymous sources as saying that Trump had ordered the firing of Russia investigation special prosecutor Robert Mueller last year, but had backed off when the White House counsel threatened to resign.
Trump dismissed it is “fake news” and “typical New York Times” before entering the hall for his speech.
Once on stage he was obliged to stand grim-faced in silence for nearly four minutes alongside Schwab listening to a solemn march played by a 30-strong Swiss brass band in Napoleonic blue uniforms and white plumed helmets.
In the lobby outside the hall, two demonstrators in white T-shirts protested quietly against Trump.
The Swiss police had banned larger rallies planned in Davos for this week during Trump’s visit, though campaign groups projected protest laser messages and unfurled an anti-Trump banner on nearby mountains.
“Listen to him, denouncing fake news. This is what he does,” said one of yesterday’s two protesters, Anya Schiffrin, a professor at Columbia University and the wife of prominent US economist Joseph Stiglitz. –