Donald Trump Says ‘Fake News’ Won’t Show His Rally’s Crowd Size As CNN Displays Split-Screen Of The Crowd

Donald Trump told attendants at his Friday rally that the so-called “fake news” outlets would not show the size of the crowd — as CNN displayed a split-screen of the entire crowd.

Trump traveled to Alabama on Friday to stump for Luther Strange, who is competing in Tuesday’s Republican runoff primary in the race to fill the U.S. Senate seat held by Jeff Sessions. Trump has taken to Twitter to endorse Strange and took the show to Huntsville for Friday’s rally, where Trump’s speech turned to one of his favorite topics — bashing the media.

During the rally, Trump attacked what he called the “fake news media” and claimed that frequent target CNN would not have the guts to show the crowd size.

“They won’t show this,” Trump said to cheers. “They’ll say, ‘Donald Trump spoke to a small crowd in Alabama last night. It was a small crowd.'”

But what Trump didn’t know was at the moment he delivered that line, CNN was actually broadcasting a split-screen showing both Trump speaking at the podium and the crowd that had gathered to hear him speak.

Trump says the fake news media won't show the crowd at his rally — while CNN is literally running a split screen of the crowd. pic.twitter.com/mRtPaAr38Z

— Jim Dalrymple II (@Dalrymple) September 23, 2017

It is not clear how much impact Donald Trump may have on the Republican primary in Alabama. Strange is running against the popular Roy Moore, a staunch conservative former judge who has strong support across the party. A poll from Fox News found that Trump’s endorsement would sway only two out of 10 Republican voters in Alabama and polling of the race shows that Moore has a six-point lead over Strange, CBS News noted.

Even some of Trump’s own cabinet members are breaking ranks, with Ben Carson publicly endorsing Moore in the race.

So the size of the crowd Donald Trump attracted in Alabama may not have much of an impact on the race, though his quip about “fake news” afraid to show the crowd had quite an impact. Video of Trump’s remarks went viral on Twitter and gained attention from a number of media outlets. Many of those pointed out — some gleefully — that Trump’s rally sizes have declined precipitously since he became president, with a recent rally in Phoenix failing even to fill the small arena where it was held.

[Featured Image by Michael B. Thomas/Getty Images]