Trump’s comments to troops about pay were not accurate

President Trump bragged Wednesday to troops stationed in Iraq that he had secured them a massive pay raise, repeating a false claim he’s made repeatedly on the campaign trail.

Trump made the boast during his first visit as president to troops in a combat zone.

Trump, who spent more than three hours along with first lady Melania Trump at al-Asad Airbase near Baghdad, addressed several hundred servicemen and women, boasting that he had delivered them “one of the biggest pay raises you’ve ever received.”

The president also stated — incorrectly — that he had authorized the first military pay increase in a decade.

“You haven’t gotten one in more than 10 years,” Trump said. “More than 10 years. And we got you a big one. I got you a big one. I got you a big one.”

Military pay, in fact, has risen every year for three decades. It was raised 2.4 percent in 2018 and will rise by 2.6 percent more in 2019, because of the National Defense Authorization Act signed by Trump in August. Although the 2.6 percent increase is the largest in nine years, Trump still exaggerated significantly, claiming that he delivered a pay raise some four times larger than that and, in another uncertain anecdote, that he fought for it over unnamed military personnel who’d wanted a smaller increase.

“They said, ‘ You know, we could make it smaller. We could make it 3 percent. We could make it 2 percent. We could make it 4 percent,’ ” Trump claimed. “I said, ‘No. Make it 10 percent. Make it more than 10 percent.’

“Because it’s been a long time. It’s been more than 10 years. It’s been more than 10 years,” he continued. “That’s a long time. And, you know, you really put yourselves out there, and you put your lives out there. So congratulations.”

Presenting himself as an ardent supporter of the military just days after the resignation of respected Defense Secretary James N. Mattis, who cited policy disagreements with the president in an astonishing resignation letter, Trump also repeated another common falsehood — his claim that the new Pentagon budget is the largest increase in defense funding ever.

The current budget authority for the Pentagon is not a record.