Blake Neff, DCNF
President-elect Donald Trump rebuked former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich via Twitter Thursday morning, saying Gingrich had “incorrectly” claimed Trump was moving away from his pledge to “drain the swamp” of corruption in Washington, D.C.
Gingrich has already responded by apologizing for his comments.
During a Tuesday interview with NPR, Gingrich claimed that Trump no longer wanted to use the phrase “drain the swamp” now that he had successfully won the election.
“He now says it was cute, but he doesn’t want to use it anymore,” Gingrich said. “I’d written what I thought was a very cute tweet about ‘the alligators are complaining,’ and somebody wrote back and said they were tired of hearing this stuff.”
But in a tweet of his own Thursday morning, Trump insisted he wasn’t moving away from draining the swamp at all.
Someone incorrectly stated that the phrase “DRAIN THE SWAMP” was no longer being used by me. Actually, we will always be trying to DTS.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 22, 2016
Shortly after Trump’s tweet, Gingrich released a tweet and short video of his own admitting he had “goofed” with his remarks.
I goofed. Draining the swamp is in, @realDonaldTrump is going to do it, and the alligators should be worried. #DTS https://t.co/nCHs61gpvepic.twitter.com/OCO7eaSKvk
— Newt Gingrich (@newtgingrich) December 22, 2016
“I made a big boo-boo,” Gingrich said in the video. “I talked this morning with president-elect Donald Trump and he reminded me, he likes draining the swamp…he intends to drain the swamp, he even calls it ‘DTS.’”
Gingrich added that Trump saw his recent feud with Boeing over the price of Air Force One was an example of working to drain the swamp.
“The alligators should be worried,” Gingrich said.
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