Former Attorney General Eric Holder took to Twitter early Tuesday to rebuke President Donald Trump over his claim that former President Barack Obama didn't make calls to the families of slain servicemen.
Trump on Monday was asked why he hadn't made any public comments about the four American soldiers killed in Niger earlier this month. The president said letters had been sent — or were going to be — before getting over his skis.
"If you look at President Obama and other presidents, most of them didn't make calls," Trump said during a press conference in the Rose Garden. "A lot of them didn't make calls. I like to call when it's appropriate, when I am able to do it. They have made the ultimate sacrifice."
"President Trump's claim is unequivocally wrong," a former Obama official said in a statement to ABC News. "President Obama engaged families of the fallen and wounded warriors throughout his presidency through calls, letters, visits to Section 60 at Arlington, visits to Walter Reed, visits to Dover, and regular meetings with Gold Star Families at the White House and across the country."
"It is unconscionable that a president would dare to ever portray another as unpatriotic, which is essentially what he was doing," Alyssa Mastromonaco, former White House deputy chief of staff, told ABC News.
Mastromonaco also tweeted out a profane response to Trump's claim.
"I don't recall anything moving him more. He saw it as his duty to console them as best he could and thank them on behalf of the nation," David Axelrod, a senior adviser to President Obama, told The New York Times.
Former President George W. Bush "wrote all the families of the fallen," Freddy Ford, spokesman for the ex-president, told ABC News.
Ford added that Bush met or called "hundreds if not thousands" of families of slain soldiers.
Ditto for former President Bill Clinton.
"He did call the families of fallen soldiers while in office," an aide to Clinton told ABC News.
"The commander in chief told a totally irresponsible and disgusting lie in the Rose Garden today, claiming past presidents did not call the families of fallen service members. Trump's jaw-dropping, disrespectful lie is not based anywhere in reality and is another symptom of a deep-seated obsession with tearing down President Obama," Democratic National Committee deputy press secretary Brian Gabriel said in a statement, ABC News reported.
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