‘I have to do what I have to do” was Donald Trump’s justification during last night’s debate for why he used what he called a corrupt visa program to hire foreign workers at his properties. After the debate, Trump proved his point when he accused a reporter of fabricating a story that she had been grabbed and bruised by his campaign manager while trying to ask Trump a question. That denial flies in the face of all the evidence.
“This was, in my opinion, made up,” Trump told CNN. “Everybody said nothing happened. Perhaps she made the story up. I think that’s what happened.”
Trump may have done what he had to do to protect Corey Lewandowski — his Red Bull–swigging Mini Me — but his statement flies in the face of all evidence. Ben Terris, a reporter at the Washington Post, wrote he witnessed Michelle Fields of Breitbart News approaching Trump after the debate. He said Lewandowski “grabbed her arm and yanked her out of the way,” bruising her. An audiotape of a conversation between Terris and Fields that took place in real time confirms the incident. (There is video footage documenting the immediate before-and-after of the incident, though not Lewandowski grabbing Fields.)
For more than 24 hours, Fields did not comment or publicly discuss the episode, but when accused of making it up she released a photo showing finger-shaped bruising on her arm.
When the incident began to gain traction in the media, Lewandowski changed his story.
As for Lewandowski, he didn’t deny the incident at first either. Lloyd Grove of the Daily Beast reported Wednesday night that “sources said Lewandowski acknowledged to Breitbart’s Washington political editor, Matthew Boyle, that he did manhandle Fields. Lewandowski’s explanation to Boyle, said these sources, was that he and Fields had never met before and that he didn’t recognize her as a Breitbart reporter, instead mistaking her for an adversarial member of the mainstream media.”
When the incident began to gain traction in the media, Lewandowski changed his story and began tweeting out attacks on Fields, calling her an “attention getting” reporter. Last night, after the debate he declined to talk to reporters. “I’m going to work with Mr. Trump tonight,” he told CNN. When asked if he had touched Fields at all, Lewandowski said: “Did you hear what I said?” Then an hour later, Lewandowski took to Twitter and attacked Fields as “totally delusional.”
Friday morning, the Independent Journal Review reported Fields has filed a police report.
#share#This is not the first time Lewandowski has been accused of intimidating the media. In January, Fox News issued a statement calling out Lewandowski for demanding that Fox News host Megan Kelly not moderate a debate in Iowa (one Trump eventually sat out).
The Fox statement read:
Capitulating to politicians’ ultimatums about a debate moderator violates all journalistic standards, as do threats, including the one leveled by Trump’s campaign manager Corey Lewandowski toward Megan Kelly. In a call on Saturday with a Fox News executive, Lewandowski stated that Megan had a “rough couple of days after that last debate” and he “would hate to have her go through that again.” Lewandowski was warned not to level any more threats, but he continued to do so. We can’t give in to terrorization toward any of our employees.
Trump was asked during last night’s CNN debate about his outrageous statements condoning violence at some of his rallies. (Yesterday, one of his supporters was charged for sucker-punching a protester at a Florida event.) But remarkably, no one at the CNN panel asked him about the Fields incident.
#related#The Trump campaign has long had only a tenuous relationship with the truth, but now it is covering up an incident involving physical intimidation of a reporter. That goes way beyond normal political gamesmanship and cries out for accountability. Any other campaign manager would be scorched for such behavior and forced to resign. If Lewandowki’s behavior is allowed to slide, just imagine how emboldened Donald Trump will be the next time he decides “I have to do what I have to do” to win.
— John Fund is National Review Online’s national-affairs correspondent.