From front page in today's NYT: That Time Trump Nearly Died in a Helicopter Crash? Didn’t Happen. In a news conference, the former president recounted a brush with death alongside Willie Brown, the former San Francisco mayor. A few aspects of the story don’t hold up to scrutiny. In November 2018, President Donald J. Trump and Gov. Jerry Brown of California visiting a neighborhood destroyed by a wildfire in Paradise, Calif. Mr. Trump and Mr. Brown also viewed the damage by helicopter.Credit...Tom Brenner for The New York Times By Heather Knight and Shawn Hubler Reporting from San Francisco and Los Angeles Published Aug. 8, 2024Updated Aug. 9, 2024, 12:10 a.m. ET Former President Donald J. Trump told a jaw-dropping story on Thursday about nearly dying in a helicopter ride with Willie Brown, the former California politician and ex-boyfriend of his rival, Vice President Kamala Harris. There was only one problem with the story. Or maybe two. Or maybe three. It wasn’t the famous former San Francisco mayor on the helicopter flight at all. It was Gov. Jerry Brown, the former governor of California, who bears little resemblance to Willie Brown. There was also no emergency landing, and the helicopter’s passengers were never in any danger at all, according to Gov. Gavin Newsom, who was also on the flight. Jerry Brown, who left office in January 2019, said through a spokesman, “There was no emergency landing and no discussion of Kamala Harris.” “I call complete B.S.,” Mr. Newsom said, laughing out loud. Mr. Trump’s errant account, delivered during a news conference at his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida, came in response to a reporter who asked a leading question about Ms. Harris’s past relationship with Willie Brown, and whether Mr. Trump thought it might have had something to do with her career trajectory. The two dated in 1994 and 1995, while she was a prosecutor in Alameda County, which includes Oakland, and he was the speaker of the California State Assembly, and he appointed her to two state boards. He was — and still is — married to Blanche Brown, but they have long lived separate lives. “Well, I know Willie Brown very well,” Mr. Trump responded. “In fact, I went down in a helicopter with him.” He went on to tell a cinematic tale of a close call with death — and of politically advantageous gossip on death’s door: “We thought maybe this was the end,” Mr. Trump said. “We were in a helicopter, going to a certain location together, and there was an emergency landing. This was not a pleasant landing. “And Willie was — he was a little concerned,” Mr. Trump continued. “So I know him, but I know him pretty well. I mean, I haven’t seen him in years. But he told me terrible things about her. But this is what you’re telling me, anyway, I guess. But he had a big part in what happened with Kamala. But he — he, I don’t know, maybe he’s changed his tune. But he — he was not a fan of hers very much, at that point.” Reached on his cellphone just after Mr. Trump’s news conference — at his regular lunch spot at Sam’s Grill in downtown San Francisco — Mr. Brown, 90, said the whole story was false. He had never ridden in a helicopter with Mr. Trump, he said. He had never nearly perished in any helicopter ride. And he remained an avid supporter of Ms. Harris’s. Mr. Brown, who loves regaling anybody who will listen with stories and who penned a weekly column in The San Francisco Chronicle until 2021, added, laughing: “You know me well enough to know that if I almost went down in a helicopter with anybody, you would have heard about it!” Ms. Harris ended their relationship nearly three decades ago, but Mr. Brown said he had always been a big fan and supporter of hers. “No hard feelings,” he said. The helicopter ride that Mr. Trump took in 2018 with Gov. Jerry Brown, 86, and with Mr. Newsom, then the governor-elect of California, was to survey damage wrought by the deadly Camp Fire in the town of Paradise, in the Sierra Nevada foothills north of Sacramento. Mr. Newsom’s recollection of the occasion was vivid. “I was on a helicopter with Jerry Brown and Trump, and it didn’t go down,” Mr. Newsom, 56, said in an interview. He said that Mr. Trump had, however, repeatedly brought up the possibility of crashing. The subject of Ms. Harris, with whom Mr. Newsom had enjoyed a friendly rivalry, did not come up on the helicopter, he added. “We talked about everyone else, but not Kamala,” he said with a laugh. Mr. Newsom called Mr. Trump’s news conference “an act of desperation” prompted by what he called Ms. Harris’s momentum. Mr. Trump’s visit to the burned forest with then-Governor Brown and Mr. Newsom did generate headlines, but not because of anything that occurred on their helicopter ride. Rather, it was because, during a news conference after landing at the scene, Mr. Trump, 78, attributed the wildfire to too many fallen, dead tree branches and said the answer to solving California’s wildfire crisis was to rake the forest floors. “It was back when we were making raking the forest great again,” Mr. Newsom said. Heather Knight is a reporter in San Francisco, leading The Times’s coverage of the Bay Area and Northern California. More about Heather Knight Shawn Hubler is based in Sacramento and covers California news, policy trends and personalities. She has been a journalist for more than four decades. More about Shawn Hubler
the drugs he takes every day for decades are most likely the reason for all this bullshit he keeps telling all the time.
John Bolton Issues Dire Warning About Trump’s Grasp of Reality Bolton said Donald Trump can’t distinguish between facts and lies. https://newrepublic.com/post/184721/john-bolton-donald-trump-mental-health-reality
Love all the trump sucker's still trying to divert the convo to Willie Brown when trump just lied to all your faces about a story, proving he is just as senile as everyone claims Joe was... but but but Willie....he was not even involved in the story and trump can't tell the difference between willie and Jerry? maybe trump needs to step down....
The Post just reported that Trump has doubled down in his story this evening. Paywalled but the others will carry it soon enough. Trump reiterates claim about helicopter trip but doesn't provide records https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/08/09/trump-willie-brown-helicopter/ The chopper whopper.
Somehow, Trump's well documented history of non-stop pathological lying does not concern his deranged supporters, but everyone else has to be perfect.
This very moment in Russia, millions are in a state of disbelief that Ukraine has invaded Russia's Kursk region. They speak with sincerity in disbelief of not understanding why Ukraine would do this to a friend, and out of the blue. Years, decades, of curating the information they are willing to incorporate into their personal reality has made this way of coping endemic. You can transpose that psychology to the MAGA people.