Donald Trump brands the press 'fake, fake disgusting news' in latest attack on the media

Donald Trump has launched his latest attack on the media, condemning “fake, fake disgusting news” during a campaign rally.

Speaking in Pennsylvania, the President turned his attention to the press in the Wilkes-Barre arena, saying: “What ever happened to the free press? What ever happened to honest reporting? They don’t report it. They only make up stories.”

His criticisms included claims that the media had diminished what he achieved at his Singapore summit with North Korea leader Kim Jong Un as well as complaints over the questioning he received in Helsinki when he met Vladimir Putin last month.

Recalling the 2016 election night, he said the only reason Pennsylvania hadn’t clinched his victory was because: “the fake news refused to call it”.

“They were suffering that night, they were suffering,” he said of election pundits, adding: “Only negative stories from the fakers back there”.

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Mr Trump’s rant provoked jeers and screams from the crowd at the press reporting on the rally.

His speech came hours after White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders held a heated exchange with reporters during a White House briefing, in which she refused to distance herself from the President’s previous assertions that the media is the “enemy” of the American people.

Sanders told reporters the president had “made his position known”.

She said: “As far as I know, I’m the first press secretary in the history of the United States that’s required Secret Service protection”, accusing the media of continuing “to ratchet up the verbal assault against the president and everyone in this administration”.