President Trump threatened to sue CNN and the New York Times over their reports about his government’s early assessment that U.S. bombing raids on Iran had set the regime’s nuclear program back by a few months — contrary to Trump’s claim that Iran’s capabilities were “totally obliterated.”
Trump’s personal lawyer on June 25 sent letters to the news outlets demanding they issue retractions and apologies. Both CNN and the Times said they responded to the letters by rejecting the claims. According to the Times, Trump’s attorney claimed the stories were defamatory, “false” and “unpatriotic.” Trump has railed against CNN, the Times and other news organizations that have reported on intelligence, alleging the outlets “want to try and demean me.”
David McCraw, SVP and deputy general counsel for the New York Times Co., wrote in a reply dated June 26 to Trump’s lawyer, Alejandro Brito, “No retraction is needed. No apology will be forthcoming. We told the truth to the best of our ability. We will continue to do so.”
In the letter, McCraw wrote, “I must admit I was surprised by your letter’s unwavering certainty that the U.S. air strike ‘unequivocally eliminated Iran’s nuclear capabilities.’ That was at odds not just with the preliminary assessments of the U.S. intelligence services that we quoted, but — of more direct relevance to this letter — at odds with what your client said following the publication of the Article.” McCraw then quoted Trump’s comments at the NATO summit saying, “The intelligence was very inconclusive. The intelligence says, ‘We don’t know, it could have been very severe’ — that’s what the intelligence says.”
The Times’ story “that the President may have overstated the case when he said the Iranian sites had been ‘obliterated,’ that the impact of the bombing raid was uncertain, that the attack did not eliminate the threat posed by Iran,” McCraw wrote, “is not false and does not defame the President.” The Times posted a copy of McCraw’s letter at this link.
A CNN rep confirmed the network received a similar letter from Trump’s lawyer and responded to it, “rejecting the claims in the letter.” The spokesperson declined to comment further.
On Tuesday, CNN was first to report that the U.S. military strikes on three Iran nuclear facilities over the weekend “did not destroy the core components of the country’s nuclear program and likely only set it back by months,” citing “an early US intelligence assessment” by the Pentagon’s Defense Intelligence Agency. The New York Times, along with other news outlets including the Associated Press and ABC News, shortly thereafter matched CNN’s reporting.
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Separately Wednesday, Trump on social media attacked Natasha Bertrand, one of CNN reporters on the Iran story, whom he said should be fired by the network and “thrown out ‘like a dog.’”
In a statement about Trump’s attack on its employee, CNN said, “We stand 100% behind Natasha Bertrand’s journalism and specifically her and her colleagues’ reporting of the early intelligence assessment of the U.S. attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities. CNN’s reporting made clear that this was an initial finding that could change with additional intelligence. We have extensively covered President Trump’s own deep skepticism about it. However, we do not believe it is reasonable to criticize CNN reporters for accurately reporting the existence of the assessment and accurately characterizing its findings, which are in the public interest.”
Also Wednesday, Trump had lashed out at CNN and the Times, writing on his Truth Social platform that the reporters for the outlets’ stories about the DIA report “are just BAD AND SICK PEOPLE. You would think they would be proud of the great success we had, instead of trying to always make our Country look bad.”
From Variety US