President Trump targeted billionaire philanthropist Laurene Powell Jobs, the widow of Apple Chairman Steve Jobs, in his latest salvo against The Atlantic for reporting that he disparaged slain American soldiers.
“Steve Jobs would not be happy that his wife is wasting money he left her on a failing Radical Left Magazine that is run by a con man (Goldberg) and spews FAKE NEWS & HATE,” Trump tweeted. “Call her, write her, let her know how you feel!!!”
The president sent the tweet in response to a post by conservative activist Charlie Kirk noting that Laurene Powell Jobs, a co-owner of The Atlantic, has donated more than $600,000 to Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden.
Trump has vehemently denied the Atlantic story, which alleges that he declined to visit a French cemetery for Americans slain during World War I and called them “losers.”
“If they really exist, if people really exist that would have said that, they’re lowlifes and they’re liars. And I would be willing to swear on anything that I never said that about our fallen heroes. There is nobody that respects them more,” Trump told reporters at Joint Base Andrews after a campaign stop in Pennsylvania on Thursday.
Fox News and The Washington Post have since matched parts of The Atlantic’s reporting.
On Saturday, Trump attacked the article’s author, Atlantic Editor-in-Chief Jeffrey Goldberg, as a “slimeball.” He separately attacked Jennifer Griffin, the Fox News reporter who backed up parts of the report, saying she “should be fired for this kind of reporting.”
The Biden campaign has also seized on the report, cutting an ad including the alleged remarks.
Former White House national security adviser John Bolton, meanwhile, has claimed he did not hear the alleged remarks, while former White House chief of staff John Kelly has declined to comment.