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President Donald Trump will not be mocked by all of the #bunkerbaby memes circulating social media.
The POTUS is striking back at critics who complained that he unjustifiably ordered police to unleashed a chemical agent on peaceful protesters near the White House on Monday evening.
READ MORE: Twitter rips Trump’s Bible photo-op in front of church after protest remarks
As previously reported by theGrio.com, in an effort to appear brave and fearless amid civil unrest, Trump had protesters forcibly removed so that he could make a dramatic walk from the White House to St. John’s Church. Once he arrived at the house of worship, he staged a photo op where he held up a Bible, signally strength to his base.
The obnoxious gesture came after reports emerged stating that the president was hiding in a bunker as Antifa and Black Lives Matter stormed the nation’s capital.
To counter criticism of this PR stunt, Trump on Thursday shared a letter from an advisor on Twitter that referred to the protesters as “terrorists.”
I thought this letter from respected retired Marine and Super Star lawyer, John Dowd, would be of interest to the American People. Read it! pic.twitter.com/I5tjysckZh
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 4, 2020
Former Trump attorney John Dowd fired off the letter to former Secretary of Defense James Mattis, according to CNN, calling reports over Trump’s handling of the protesters as “fake news.”
https://open.spotify.com/episode/3ZuyOfTmcLfkxzqMdftiCV
“The phony protesters near Lafayette were not peaceful and are not real,” Dowd’s letter states. “They are terrorists using idle hate-filled students to burn and destroy. They were abusing and disrespecting the police when the police were preparing the area for the 1900 curfew.”
The President has repeatedly defended his response to the protests.
“They didn’t use tear gas,” Trump told Fox News Radio on Wednesday.
“We now know through the U.S. Park Police that neither they nor any of their law enforcement partners, used tear gas to quell rising violence,” said Trump’s 2020 communications director Tim Murtaugh.
READ MORE: Biden calls out Trump’s lack of leadership: ‘I won’t fan the flames of hate’
“Every news organization which reported the tear gas lie should immediately correct or retract its erroneous reporting,” he added.
The U.S. Park Police said in a statement Tuesday that “no tear gas was used by USPP officers or other assisting law enforcement partners to close the area at Lafayette Park,” while also admitting it had deployed “pepper balls” and “smoke canisters,” ABC News reports.
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