The Scotsman

Trump claims to be ‘exact opposite’ of portrayal in book

- By ZEKE MILLER in Washington

US president Donald Trump has said he is “the exact opposite” of Bob Woodward’s portrayal of him in a new book.

Mr Trump took to Twitter to complain about the journalist’s book – Fear: Trump In The White House – which claims the president’s chief of staff John Kelly disparaged him as an “idiot”.

Mr Kelly is also quoted in the book by the reporter who helped break the original Watergate scandal as lamenting: “We’re in Crazytown.”

American defence secretary Jim Mattis is quoted in the book as telling associates that Mr Trump acted like, and has the understand­ing of, “a fifth or sixth-grader”. Both officials have denied those accounts.

The book also says presidenti­al aides snatched sensitive documents off Mr Trump’s desk to keep him from making impulsive decisions.

The White House said the portrayal of Mr Trump is false, and blamed the negative illustrati­on of his presidency on disgruntle­d former employees. Mr Trump later complained people can “get away with” such depictions and again suggested changing American libel laws.

The US president tweeted: “Isn’t it a shame that someone can write an article or book, totally make up stories and form a picture of a person that is literally the exact opposite of the fact, and get away with it without retributio­n or cost.”

He added: “Don’t know why Washington politician­s don’t change libel laws?”

The book by the reporter who helped bring down president Richard Nixon is the latest to throw the Trump administra­tion into damage-control mode with explosive anecdotes and concerns about the commander-in-chief.

Mr Trump said the quotes and stories in the book were “frauds, a con on the public,” adding that Mr Mattis and Mr Kelly had denied uttering their quoted criticisms of the president. On accounts that senior aides snatched sensitive documents off his desk to keep him from making impulsive decisions, Mr Trump told The Daily Caller: “There was nobody taking anything from me.”

In a statement to the Washington Post, Mr Woodward said: “I stand by my reporting.”

White House spokeswoma­n Sarah Huckabee Sanders said the book did not accurately depict the administra­tion, adding that it had been “pretty widely pushed back on”.

Mr Trump’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani also hit back at his own portrayal in the book, saying an incident depicted in the book was “entirely false”, and adding that Mr Woodward “never called me”.

In the book, Mr Trump blasts Mr Giuliani after he appears on Sunday talk shows to defend the then-candidate in the wake of the infamous “Access Hollywood” tape, in which Mr Trump is heard to make lewd claims about groping women.

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