Trump plays reporters, so reporters erase his hotel tour

(Image credit: Getty Images)

published 16 September 2016

Like any good entertainer, Donald Trump understands the power of suspense. Early Friday morning, Trump flirted with ending his years-long tirade against President Barack Obama over the authenticity of his birth certificate by telling Fox Business to "watch my statement."

"We have to keep the suspense going, okay?" Trump explained to Fox Business.

But what Trump miscalculated was the power of the letdown. Speaking for only seconds at the opening of his Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C., it quickly became clear to the press that they'd been had. In protest, Maggie Haberman of The New York Times reports that Trump's pool of press members assigned to cover him actually "erased the tape of his tour of the hotel [after the speech] in protest of [the] bait-and-switch [with] no editorial access."

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Jeva Lange was the executive editor at TheWeek.com. She formerly served as The Week's deputy editor and culture critic. She is also a contributor to Screen Slate, and her writing has appeared in The New York Daily News, The Awl, Vice, and Gothamist, among other publications. Jeva lives in New York City. Follow her on Twitter.