Trump Falsely Claimed 2 People Were Fatally Shot During Obama's Farewell In Chicago

By Stephen Gossett in News on Jan 27, 2017 5:12PM

President Donald Trump falsely claimed in an interview on Wednesday with ABC News that two people were fatally shot in Chicago while former-president Barack Obama delivered his farewell address. In fact, no one was shot in the city during that timeframe, and no one was fatally shot on that day at all, according to police.

“Look, when President Obama was there two weeks ago making a speech, a very nice speech, two people were shot and killed during his speech,” Trump told ABC News’ David Muir. “You can’t have that.”

Obama delivered his farewell speech on the evening of Jan. 10, at McCormick Place, to a packed house.

“They weren’t shot at the speech. But they were shot in the city of Chicago during his speech. What, what’s going on?” Trump said.

But according to Chicago police, no one was shot at all during that stretch of time, roughly 8 to 9 p.m. A 22-year-old man was shot at 9:10 p.m. in the 1500 block of S. Kolin Ave., and he was taken to Mt. Sinai Hospital in fair condition. No one in Chicago was shot on Jan. 10 between 2:30 and 9:10 p.m., according to police records sent to Chicagoist. There were five shooting incidents in total that day, and none were fatal.

Elsewhere in the interview, Trump compared Chicago to Afghanistan and said the city might be too "politically correct" to solve violent crime. Trump Tweeted on Tuesday night that he'd send in "the feds" to Chicago if local government and law enforcement doesn't reduce violence. Chicago had a higher homicide rate than some large cities, such as New York City and Los Angeles, in 2016, but it ranked outside the top ten in terms of murder rate per capita.

[H/T Tribune]