FactChecking Trump on ‘Meet the Press’

Kristen Welker’s first week as the new moderator of NBC’s “Meet the Press” featured an interview with former President Donald Trump, and she was busy trying to push back on his numerous false and misleading statements.

Here are some that we identified:

• Trump denied that he asked a staffer at Mar-a-Lago to delete security camera footage, arguing that the recordings were provided to federal investigators. The indictment alleges Trump tried, through intermediaries, to convince an IT staffer to delete the footage, but the staffer refused.

• He said that if reelected he “certainly might” pardon some of those convicted for crimes related to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, because “some of them never even went into the building” and were sentenced to “many years” in prison. That’s true, but those people were convicted for helping to plan the attack or committing violent acts outside the building.

• Trump falsely claimed that then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi turned down his offer to provide 10,000 National Guard members at the Capitol on Jan. 6 and that the House Jan. 6 committee destroyed all the evidence about it.

• The former president said he could have pardoned himself before he left office and “saved me … all of these fake charges.” Legal experts say it’s dubious that Trump could have pardoned himself, and in any case, it would not have saved him from the state indictments he faces or the federal classified documents case, which pertains mostly to actions Trump took after he left office.

• Trump misleadingly claimed that Democrats want to allow abortions “after five months, six months, seven months, eight months, nine months,” and he falsely claimed that they say “even after birth, you’re allowed to terminate the baby.”

• He overstated and understated the respective amounts of financial assistance that the U.S. and European nations have allocated to help Ukraine in the war with Russia.

Trump Denies Asking Staff to Destroy Security Tapes

Trump denied that he asked a staffer at Mar-a-Lago to delete security camera footage, saying repeatedly that no footage was ever deleted and that recordings were provided to federal investigators.

But the federal indictment regarding Trump’s handling of presidential documents does not allege that Trump deleted the security footage, only that he tried — through intermediaries — to get a staffer to delete the recordings. The indictment says the staffer refused.

: A new charge suggests you asked a