Trump fumes after NYT report suggests he didn’t know ‘basic elements’ of Senate health care bill

President Trump is fuming over a New York Times report that suggested he doesn’t understand some key points of the Republican plan to repeal and replace Obamacare.

“The failing @nytimes writes false story after false story about me,” Trump tweeted. “They don’t even call to verify the facts of a story. A Fake News Joke!”

The newspaper disputed Trump’s claim.

“We always call the White House for comment,” a Times spokeswoman told Yahoo News. “The president’s tweet is incorrect.”

Glenn Thrush, who co-authored the story with fellow Times reporter Jonathan Martin, also disputed the assertion, tweeting that the pair “spoke to many, many, many members” of the president’s staff and “ran everything by” Trump’s team.

The Times reported that a Republican senator who attended Monday’s health care meeting at the White House left with “a sense that the president did not have a grasp of some basic elements of the Senate plan” and “seemed especially confused when a moderate Republican complained that opponents of the bill would cast it as a massive tax break for the wealthy.”

The paper also reported Trump — who helped get the GOP’s health care legislation passed in the House — has not been nearly as involved in the Senate’s negotiations.

“Until Tuesday’s meeting at the White House, Mr. Trump had spoken with only a few members of the Senate, according to an administration official,” the report said. “The pace was nothing like the dozens of calls he made to help pass the House’s health bill, aides said.”

Back in February, Trump told a meeting of governors at the White House that he was surprised to learn the complexity of the nation’s health laws.

“Now, I have to tell you, it’s an unbelievably complex subject,” Trump said. “Nobody knew health care could be so complicated.”

Trump has long complained about the media’s coverage of his presidency — frequently describing the Times and CNN as “fake news.”

Trump also lashed out at the Washington Post, which on Tuesday reported that a framed copy of Time magazine with Trump on the cover — displayed in at least two of Trump’s golf clubs — is fake.

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