Oh, fer fuck's sake. Facts, truth, reality and other such inconveniences mean little to Donald Trump, who dismisses them with the wave of his hand and his now patented "I don't believe it" bullshit. Nor should he have to believe the experts, because he's "like, a really smart person," in case you missed it.
Present Trump with studies that show the prison population does not include more immigrants than the national population, and he simply "does not believe it," and swings right into his racist rant. Show him research that proves the U.S. is not being "invaded" by brown people from the south, but that immigration is actually down, and Trump ignores the facts and continues his fear-mongering. Bring up media reports that show immigrants do not commit an inordinate number of burglaries, murders and rapes, and he'll roll his eyes and scold the liberal press.
Facts, schmacks.
Now he's trying to cover up another Trump lie by blaming Phoenix fire marshals for allowing 15,000 to 20,000 people (his estimate) into an event here yesterday at the Convention Center. As yougotberned's recommended diary notes, Donald Trump has a funny notion of what 20,000 people looks like. But when confronted with the fact that the room's capacity is slightly more than 4,000, and the main security officer's clicker read 4,299, Trump did not back down from his 20,000 person estimate. Instead, he criticized Phoenix officials for allowing three or four times as many people in the room than code permits.
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump posted a tweet Sunday claiming the City of Phoenix violated its fire code by allowing a crowd at his event Saturday that was more than three times the room's capacity.
Trump and his campaign were declaring through the day Saturday that there were 10,000, 15,000 or 20,000 people at the event at the Phoenix Convention Center. The hall where the rally was held has a maximum occupancy of 4,200.
Trump's tweets today said Phoenix officials "did not want to have thousands of people standing outside in the heat, so they let them in." Donald, if you happened to look at those people "standing outside in the heat," you'd notice they were protestors! (Who also made up some of the 4,200 in the hall.) The truth is, Convention Center officials offered the campaign a larger room, but Trump's people declined, because 4,000 or 5,000 in a room capable of holding 10,000 (a Sanders crowd) wouldn't present the right optics.
Every news organization estimated the Phoenix crowd at about 4,200—a decent size but not enough for Trump's fact-free ego, which demanded Bernie-like numbers. Still, fire officials were adamant that they did not permit 15,000 or 20,000 people into the space.
A spokeswoman for the Phoenix Fire Department and a person who was on-site Saturday and familiar with security arrangements said Trump was wrong.
"There's no way that would be allowed," said Phoenix Fire Department spokeswoman Shelly Jamison. "No one from Phoenix fire will be wowed by Donald Trump and turn the other cheek."
Speculation runs rampant here that Trump will select his anti-immigrant partner at the Phoenix event, Sheriff Joe Arpaio, as his running mate in 2016. Oh, please, please, please! If he does, Trump will have, like, 5 billion people at every event. Trust him, he'd know, he's really smart. So he says, as long as facts don't matter.
Originally posted to Maggie's Farm on Sun Jul 12, 2015 at 02:58 PM PDT.
Also republished by Phoenix Kossacks and Baja Arizona Kossacks.
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