Today, the current occupant of the Oval Office will seize the opportunity to celebrate himself — rather than American Independence — in the best way he knows how: lying.
Here is an excerpt from an article by Calvin Woodward, Hope Yen, and Robert Burns for the Associated Press.
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WASHINGTON (AP) — In his Fourth of July remarks, President Donald Trump will claim to be celebrating the armed forces and showcasing what he’s done for them. But in recent days, he has falsified his record on military matters on several fronts.
He’s claimed, for example, that he came up with the “genius idea” of giving veterans private health care so they don’t have to wait for Veterans Affairs appointments, only to find out that others had thought of it but failed to get it done.
President Barack Obama signed the law getting it done in 2014.
Trump also made the flatly false statement that he won troops their first raise in a decade, suggested he’s made progress reducing veteran suicides that is not backed up by the numbers, and contradicted the record in claiming that North Korea is cooperating on the return of the remains of U.S. troops.
A look at his statements on military matters and personnel, some of which may be heard from the stage Thursday or in tweets:
MILITARY PAY
TRUMP, addressing military members: “You also got very nice pay raises for the last couple of years. Congratulations. Oh, you care about that. They care about that. I didn’t think you noticed. Yeah, you were entitled. You know, it was close to 10 years before you had an increase. Ten years. And we said, ‘It’s time.’ And you got a couple of good ones, big ones, nice ones.” — remarks Sunday at Osan Air Base, South Korea.
THE FACTS: He’s been spreading this falsehood for more than a year, soaking up cheers from crowds for something he didn’t do. In May 2018, for example, he declared to graduates of the U.S. Naval Academy: “We just got you a big pay raise. First time in 10 years.”
U.S. military members have received a pay raise every year for decades.
Trump also boasts about the size of the military pay raises under his administration, but there’s nothing extraordinary about them.
Several raises in the last decade have been larger than service members are getting under Trump — 2.6% this year, 2.4% last year, 2.1% in 2017.
Raises in 2008, 2009 and 2010, for example, were all 3.4% or more.
Pay increases shrank after that because of congressionally mandated budget caps. Trump and Congress did break a trend that began in 2011 of pay raises that hovered between 1% and 2%.