Trump Lies Again, Committing a Crime in the Process

It appears Donald Trump has broken the law yet again in order to justify his baseless tweet last weekend that Alabama was at risk of being hit by Hurricane Dorian. That tweet was so reckless, in fact, that Alabama’s National Weather Service issued a correction, noting that Alabama would “NOT see any impacts from #Dorian.” 

But Trump got the last word yesterday, during one of his indispensable hurricane updates from the Oval Office.  He apparently altered a landfall forecast with a Sharpie so it would look like Alabama had originally been at risk.  According to multiple sources, Trump himself used a sharpie to make it look like the forecasted cone of uncertainty incuded Alabama.

To make things even worse, Trump used a 7-day old NOAA chart (likely, on purpose) to justify his idiotic tweet last week that Alabama was in jeopardy.  “It was going to hit not only Florida but Georgia—was going toward the Gulf,” Trump bullshitted, “that was what was originally projected, and it took a right turn.”

As it turns out, falsifying a forecast is actually illegal.  (Oooops!)   Not that Trump is much of a stickler for the law, but here’s U.S. Code, Title: 18, Section: 2074 on False Weather Reports: “Whoever knowingly issues or publishes any counterfeit weather forecast or warning of weather conditions falsely representing such forecast or warning to have been issued or published by the Weather Bureau,  United States Signal Service, or other branch of the Government service, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ninety days, or both.”

A reporter later asked Trump whether he altered the map he showed in the Oval Office and he didn’t deny it. “I don't know. I don't know. I don't know," he said. How could this pathetic episode possibly get more embarrassing?