Trump told a reporter today that he did speak directly with his intel chiefs that he ranted against yesterday morning, and that they told him they were misquoted by the media:
Q: "Did you talk to your intelligence chiefs today about the displeasure you had with their…"
— CSPAN (@cspan) January 31, 2019
President Trump: "I did. They said that they were totally misquoted, and they were totally – it was taken out of context…The said it was fake news." pic.twitter.com/odd6tVSxfY
I would have loved for that meeting to be on video, but unfortunately we don’t have that.
What’s interesting to me is that Trump yelled at them on Twitter before talking with them, to find out their side of it. Assuming he isn’t exaggerating their comments, I hope he apologized to them for not speaking with them first. He should also make an public apology on Twitter.
Their actual comments are public record and I don’t think they were ‘misquoted’ in the literal sense. I can only assume that they felt the intent and context of their comments was mischaracterized, as they were immediately pitted against Trump by the New York Times. And then everyone else ran with it.
But I doubt they’ll speak on the record about this. If they do we’ll bring it to you.