CNN Fact-Checker Publishes 78 Stunning Examples Exposing Trump’s Latest Lie
President Donald Trump on Sunday made numerous false claims about Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine and besieged leader Volodymyr Zelenskyy, and one allegation was so easily refuted that CNN fact-checker Daniel Dale couldn’t help but debunk it.
“Trump’s claim isn’t even accurate,” Dale wrote Monday night on CNN.com.
The Trump administration has given Ukraine until Thursday to approve its proposal to end the conflict with Russia or lose US military support, with Trump claiming on social media that “UKRAINE’S ‘LEAD’ HAS EXPRESSED ZERO GRATITUDE FOR OUR EFFORTS.”
Dale noted in his lengthy column on Monday that Zelenskyy has done so on numerous occasions since Russia launched its invasion in 2022, citing a whopping 78 examples spanning from January of that year to last Sunday, after Trump criticized Zelenskyy as ungrateful.
“Zelensky has said it on social media, sometimes tagging Trump’s account,” Dale wrote. “He has said it to Trump face to face. He has said it to Trump appointees and members of Congress. He has said it in Ukraine, the United States and other countries.”
He continued: “In fact, Zelensky said it. last week.”
On Sunday, Trump called the invasion “The War Between Russia and Ukraine,” arguing that it “WOULD NEVER HAVE HAPPENED” if the 2020 election had not been “FIGGED AND STOLEN” by former President Joe Biden or, as he called it, “the Sleeping Joe Biden Administration.”
Zelenskyy appeared to be responding to that Truth Social post when he posted a video thanking “each and every person” who is helping Ukraine, including “the president of the United States,” and “personally” thanked Trump for “saving Ukrainian lives” in another post.
Zelenskyy has done so repeatedly over the years, as Dale listed on Monday.
“We are very grateful to President Trump, to the United States and to all the American people,” Zelenskyy told US Army Secretary Dan Driscoll last week in kyiv, according to a summary of the meeting released by the Ukrainian president’s office.
“I also extend my deep gratitude to American companies, the Department of Energy and US President Donald Trump,” he said on November 16 in Greece, adding: “We are grateful to the American people and the president once again.”
Julia Demaree Nikhinson/News
The fact-checker noted in his column Monday that Trump only criticized the Ukrainian leader on Sunday after he “rejected” the administration’s proposal to end the war, which comes with “many proposals for concessions to Russia,” including swaths of land.
“And it echoed the controversial February meeting with Zelensky in which Trump told the Ukrainian president, ‘You need to be more grateful,’” Dale wrote. “On the day of that meeting, CNN published a list of examples of Zelensky thanking… the United States.”
He then noted that this list, published in full Monday at the bottom of the column, has been updated with 44 additional examples since February, when Trump and Vice President JD Vance berated Zelenskyy during a hostile White House meeting televised around the world.
“This list is not intended to be exhaustive,” Dale wrote. “In particular, we did not review most of the comments Zelensky made in Ukrainian during the war, and of course we do not know what he said in most of his closed-door conversations.”