Sean Spicer Corrects the Misrepresentation of the Attendance At The Inaugural Speech — Transcript

Full transcript

1. 0:00good evening uh thank you guys for
2. 0:02coming I know our F first official press
3. 0:04briefing is going to be on Monday but I
4. 0:05wanted to give you a few updates on the
5. 0:07president's activities uh but before I
6. 0:09get to the news of the day I think I'd
7. 0:11like to discuss a little bit of the
8. 0:12coverage of the past 24 hours yesterday
9. 0:15at a time when our nation and the world
10. 0:17was watching the peaceful transition of
11. 0:19power and as the president said the
12. 0:21transition in the balance of power from
13. 0:23Washington to the citizens of the United
14. 0:25States member some members of the media
15. 0:27were engaged in deliberately false
16. 0:29reporting for all the talk about the
17. 0:31proper use of Twitter two instances
18. 0:34yesterday stand out one was a
19. 0:37particularly egregious example in which
20. 0:38a reporter falsely tweeted out that the
21. 0:41bust of Martin Luther King Jr had been
22. 0:44removed from the Oval Office after it
23. 0:46was pointed out that this was just plain
24. 0:48wrong the reporter casually reported and
25. 0:52tweeted out and tried to claim that a
26. 0:53secret service must agent must have just
27. 0:55been standing in front of it this was
28. 0:58irresponsible and Reckless
29. 1:01secondly photographs of the inaugural
30. 1:03proceedings were intentionally framed in
31. 1:05a way in one particular tweet to
32. 1:07minimize the enormous support that had
33. 1:09gathered on the National Mall this was
34. 1:12the first time in our nation's history
35. 1:14that floor coverings have been used to
36. 1:15protect the grass in the mall that had
37. 1:17the effect of highlighting any areas
38. 1:19where people were not standing while in
39. 1:21years past the grass eliminated this
40. 1:24visual this was also the first time that
41. 1:26fencing and magnetometers went as far
42. 1:28back on the wall preventing hundreds of
43. 1:30thousands of people from being able to
44. 1:33access the mall as quickly as they had
45. 1:35in inaugurations past inaccurate numbers
46. 1:38involving crowd size were also tweeted
47. 1:40no one had numbers because the National
48. 1:43Park Service which controls the National
49. 1:45Mall does not put any out by the way
50. 1:49this applies to any attempts to try to
51. 1:50count the number of protesters today in
52. 1:52the same fashion we do know a few things
53. 1:55so let's go through the facts we know
54. 1:57that from the platform where the
55. 1:59president was sworn in to Fourth Street
56. 2:00holds about 250,000 people from Fourth
57. 2:03Street to the media tent is about
58. 2:05another
59. 2:06220,000 and from the media tent to the
60. 2:08Washington Monument another another
61. 2:10250,000
62. 2:12people all of this space was full when
63. 2:14the president took the oath of office we
64. 2:17know that 420,000 people used the DC
65. 2:20Metro Public Transit yesterday which
66. 2:22actually compares to 317,000 that used
67. 2:25it for President Obama's last Inaugural
68. 2:28this was the largest audience to ever
69. 2:30witness an inauguration period both in
70. 2:33person and around the globe even the New
71. 2:36York Times printed a photog photograph
72. 2:39showing the that a a misrepresentation
73. 2:42of the crowd in the original tweet in
74. 2:44their paper which showed the full extent
75. 2:46of the support depth and crowd and
76. 2:48intensity that existed these attempts to
77. 2:50lessen the enthusiasm of the
78. 2:52inauguration are shameful and wrong the
79. 2:55president was also at the central as you
80. 2:57know the president was at the Central
81. 2:58Intelligence Agency today and greeted by
82. 3:00a rockus overflow crowd of some 400 plus
83. 3:04CIA employees there were over a thousand
84. 3:07requests to attend prompting the
85. 3:09president to note that he'll have to
86. 3:10come back to greet the rest the
87. 3:12employees were ecstatic that he's the
88. 3:13new commander-in-chief and he delivered
89. 3:16them an powerful and important message
90. 3:19he told them he has their back and they
91. 3:22were grateful for that they gave him a
92. 3:245minute standing ovation at the end in a
93. 3:27display of their patriotism and their
94. 3:29enthusias for his presidency I'd also
95. 3:32note that it's a shame that the CIA
96. 3:34didn't have a CIA director to be with
97. 3:36him today when he visited because the
98. 3:38Democrats have chosen Senate Democrats
99. 3:40are stalling the nomination of Mike
100. 3:42Pompeo and playing politics with
101. 3:45National Security that's what you guys
102. 3:47should be writing and covering that this
103. 3:49instead of sewing division about tweets
104. 3:52and and false narratives the president
105. 3:55is committed to unifying our country and
106. 3:57that was the focus of his inaugural
107. 3:59address this kind of dishonesty in the
108. 4:01media the challenging that bringing
109. 4:03about our nation together is making it
110. 4:04more difficult there's been a lot of
111. 4:06talk in the media about the
112. 4:07responsibility to hold Donald Trump
113. 4:09accountable and I'm here to tell you
114. 4:10that it goes two ways we're going to
115. 4:12hold the Press accountable as well the
116. 4:15American people deserve and as long
117. 4:17deserve better and as long as he serves
118. 4:19as the messenger for this incredible
119. 4:20movement he will take his message
120. 4:22directly to the American people where
121. 4:25his Focus will always be
122. 4:32[Music]
123. 4:35all I feel
124. 4:36[Music]
125. 4:40is ever seen light you ever seen that
126. 4:44trth you ever seen my got fa well how
127. 4:46about it I doubt it there's nowhere h