Jimmy Carter is baffled by Trump's lies

Jimmy Carter interview.
(Image credit: Screenshot/CBS This Morning)

President Trump has made 2,369 false statements as president as of Tuesday, per The Toronto Star's count. Former President Jimmy Carter thinks he never "deliberately" made any while he was in office.

In a segment of a CBS This Morning interview that aired Tuesday, the former president discussed building houses for Habitat for Humanity — and the current president's untrustworthy track record. While Carter gently reminded viewers that he was "not here to criticize the president," he did have some strong words for Trump's "deplorable" disregard for the truth.

Telling the truth is "pretty deeply ingrained," Carter said of himself. "I think I went through my campaign and my presidency without ever lying to the people or making a deliberately false statement," which makes it "even more deplorable" that President Trump has "abandoned" the virtue. But Carter prefers to pray for the president rather than criticize him, saying he hopes "America will learn from its mistakes" and eventually "elect the best person."

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

In another snippet of the interview, Carter heaped praise on the late Sen. John McCain for his "commitment to the truth," showing how strongly Carter believes that honesty is the best policy. Watch Carter don a construction hat and discuss the president on CBS This Morning below. Kathryn Krawczyk

Continue reading for free

We hope you're enjoying The Week's refreshingly open-minded journalism.

Subscribed to The Week? Register your account with the same email as your subscription.

Kathryn Krawczyk

Kathryn is a graduate of Syracuse University, with degrees in magazine journalism and information technology, along with hours to earn another degree after working at SU's independent paper The Daily Orange. She's currently recovering from a horse addiction while living in New York City, and likes to share her extremely dry sense of humor on Twitter.