Former president Donald Trump hit out at presenter Piers Morgan and accused him of doctoring the promo of his interview to suggest that the Republican leader stormed out of the room.
In a series of shots, an irate Mr Trump is shown grimacing as Mr Morgan calls the 2020 election “free and fair” and says the ex-president “never produced the hard evidence” to prove otherwise. The former president was seen trying to interject by shouting “excuse me” over and over again.
In a statement on Thursday, Mr Trump said: “Piers Morgan, like the rest of the fake news media, attempted to unlawfully and deceptively edit his long and tedious interview.”
“He wanted to make it look like I walked out on the interview when my time limit of 20 minutes went over by an hour. The interview was very strong on the 2020 election fraud, with me calling him ‘a fool’ if he truly believed those results,” the statement read.
Mr Morgan, who has joined the Rupert Murdoch-owned TalkTV to host his own programme Piers Morgan Uncensored, took to Twitter on Wednesday to post a jump-cut filled clip of the interview to promote his new show.
“For those who want to make Piers look bad, compare his video promo and how it was doctored to the real thing. Hopefully, they will now be doing some big changes to their final product,” Mr Trump added.
In the chaotic 30-sec clip shared by Mr Morgan, the president says: “I think I’m a very honest man, much more than you actually.”
After Mr Morgan says “it was a free and fair election – you lost”, the Republican leader replies: “Only a fool would think that.”
“You think I’m a fool?” asks Mr Morgan.
“I do now,” the former president replies.
The 45th president also called his vice president Mike Pence “foolish and weak”, and Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell “stupid”, according to Mr Morgan.
The final second of the advert shows Mr Trump standing up and ordering cameras to shut down as he walked away saying: “Very dishonest.”
The presenter added that he was called a fool six times by the “annoyed” president, according to The Sun.
“The next day, I sent Trump an email thanking him for his time and included these words: ‘You had every right to get annoyed and call me a fool for not believing the election was stolen from you, but I also have every right to my opinion, and I wasn’t going to lie to your face just to avoid annoying you’,” Mr Morgan wrote.
“The best friends are the most honest/critical ones, not the sycophants.”
