With less than a month to go before the midterm election, the Elitist Media have fabricated a new hoax to play with and it’s a doozy, taking a portion of a statement from President Trump out of context to suggest that he’d be fine with letting the homicidal Iranian regime bomb Los Angeles and San Diego. In CNN’s case, some of their hosts do so even after the network’s own fact-check.
Our Curtis Houck memorialized the initial pounce, but imagine my shock when none other than Daniel Dale popped out of a box of Tim Horton’s in order to correct the record:
This isn’t a direct quote from Trump, and I very much don’t think it’s a correct paraphrase. Trump has repeatedly argued that the consequences of the war, like higher gas prices, are a small price to pay compared to what an unchecked Iran could allegedly do. Last night, in especially rambling and incomplete fashion, he 1) claimed high prices are temporary and suggested they’re “artificial”; 2) contrasted that to the damage of Iran supposedly taking out a city; 3) and then, in especially confusing style, repeated his old point that “this,” as in the consequences of the war, is a small price to pay to avoid something like a a city being wiped out. It’s Trump’s fault you kinda have to be steeped in TrumpRallySpeak to know what he was saying last night, and of course you can say it’s inappropriate regardless for the president to casually float the possibility of a city being wiped out, but the context exists and is important.
— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) October 6, 2026
The Elitist Media continued to push the L.A.-San Diego lie, notwithstanding a hallowed fact-check from one of their own. The lie even spread to CNN’s prime time block. Watch Lulu García-Navarro of The New York Times, sitting in for Abby Phillip on NewsNight as she titters her way through both sides of Trump’s statement:
Hours after CNN's own Trump-hostile fact-checker determined Trump didn't call for Iran to wipe L.A. and San Diego out, CNN (sub) hosts are still suggesting he did. @ScottJenningsKY and @jasonrantz promptly shot this bad-faith frame down. pic.twitter.com/rkFU1Q7iWi
— Jorge Bonilla (@BonillaJL) October 7, 2026
LULU GARCÍA-NAVARRO There is a lot of debate as to whether the president, again, is hurting or helping. Let's play his comments about Iran, the war, and some cities in California.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP: We have to stop them from having a nuclear weapon. So, I was riding in Iowa. I made a speech there, and I passed a gas station, $1.95 a gallon. I passed another station, $1.85 a gallon. We'll have it lower than that in a very short period of time.
And, again, remember, with the war, it's just artificial. It's a little bit high. It's a small price to pay for keeping the world safe, keeping our country safe. They can take out a city. Let them take -- let it -- let them take out Los Angeles. Let them take out San Diego. That's -- this is a very small price to pay, and it's going to be over very soon.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GARCIA-NAVARRO: I mean, with comments like that, obviously up to interpretation. I want to be clear --- no, I'll -- no, but some -- but wait a second. What I'm trying to say here is that one version says that the president meant this just to talk about how Iran is, you know, likely a huge threat, and another version says that he, you know, might have meant it. And what is your --
SCOTT JENNINGS: This is the latest bloodbath-type hoax, where you take something the president said. He was quite clear. His position is he -- listen to the whole thing, and a number of even Democrats and liberal fact-checker types have come out today to say, no, this is being totally misconstrued. He's saying, they could have the capacity to do this if we don't stop them, and that's why we're fighting and that's why it's worth it.
Any honest person listening to that knows that's exactly what he was doing, but a lot of people got spun up on --
GARCIA-NAVARRO: Why do you think it's hard to understand what the president means sometimes?
JASON RANTZ: Not in that clip.
JENNINGS: No, you couldn't.
RANTZ: Not in that clip. I mean, I'm with you. I think you're right sometimes. Not in that clip.
It was crystal clear what it was he was saying there. Anyone acting in good faith can listen to that and know specifically.
García-Navarro, like host Abby Phillip, did the thing where the moderator takes a side in the debate- in this case, ignoring Dale’s own (reluctant) fact-check and pushing the bad-faith frame.
Scott Jennings and Jason Rantz were all over this, and immediately pushed back on the media’s interpretation of what the President said. Jennings rightly identified this incident as yet another media hoax. Par for the course from the Trump-deranged media with a midterm just 27 days out.
