U.S. President Donald Trump has put himself in the eye of a storm over his comments about the path of a hurricane.
Most of Trump’s recent tweets about Hurricane Dorian, now lashing the eastern U.S. seaboard, have focused on the southern state of Alabama – which weather forecasters say was never in the storm’s direct path.
The president, however, has been arguing otherwise and hurling his “fake news” invective at media pointing out the discrepancy.
Even network television forecasters and government meteorologists – who typically eschew being drawn into political controversies – have firmly rebutted the president.
Trump remains obdurate.
“Alabama was going to be hit or grazed, and then Hurricane Dorian took a different path (up along the East Coast). The Fake News knows this very well. That’s why they’re the Fake News!” said the president in his latest tweet about the matter, adding more fuel to the storm of controversy.
Trump faced further media mockery after he displayed an old National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration hurricane forecast map in the Oval Office on Wednesday that had been altered with a pen to extend the projected path of the hurricane into southern Alabama.
Some news reports quoted anonymous White House officials saying the president himself had made the alteration with a "Sharpie" felt marker.
White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham countered by tweeting an image of a hurricane map on the CNN network that had Alabama mistakenly labeled as Mississippi, a neighboring state.
“Hi @CNN, I know you guys are busy analyzing lines on a map, but perhaps you use your time to study up on U.S. geography?,” she wrote.
CNN responded on Twitter to the White House Press Secretary Thursday afternoon.
"Thanks, Stephanie. Yes we made a mistake (which we fixed in less than 30 seconds). And now we are admitting it. You all should try it sometime."
Trump, later on Wednesday, was questioned by reporters about the change to the chart he had displayed.
“In all cases, Alabama was hit -- if not lightly, in some cases pretty hard. Georgia, Alabama -- it was a different route. They actually gave that a 95 percent chance probability,” responded the president.
Pressed about the hand-drawn ‘Sharpie’ extension, Trump replied: “I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t know.”
Subsequent newscasts pointed out that altering a U.S. government weather forecast is a federal crime.
The manipulated map, which made #sharpiegate a trending topic on Twitter and generated satirical memes, also became fodder for TV comedians late Wednesday.
“I'm impressed that Trump can locate Alabama on a map,” Trevor Noah said on Comedy Central’s ‘Daily Show.’ “But still, the president of the United States just changed a map with a Sharpie to make himself look right, and he thought we wouldn't notice.”
“Before I did that, it was a Category 5," said The Late Show’ host Stephen Colbert on CBS, mimicking Trump. “Now, she's a Category 10.”
On ABC, Jimmy Kimmel remarked, “Not only do we have fake news, we now have fake weather, too.”
Meanwhile, Dorian has taken a northward turn, hugging the Atlantic Coast and battering the Carolinas with storm surge flooding, damaging winds and tornadoes.
