Trump attacks NBC over his remarks on civil war generals Lee and Grant

Donald Trump fired another shot in his uncivil war with the American media on Sunday, over an NBC News tweet he said “totally and purposely changed the point and meaning of my story about General Robert E Lee and General Ulysses Grant”.

Trump discussed the civil war generals during a typically freewheeling rally in Lebanon, Ohio, on Friday night. Amid the usual amused or horrified reaction on social media, NBC tweeted video with the text: “WATCH: President Trump says ‘Robert E Lee was a great general’ during Ohio rally, calling the Confederate leader ‘incredible’.”

Trump had indeed called Lee a “great general” but had referred to Grant as “incredible”.

In his tweet on Sunday, the president said his remarks had been “a shoutout to warrior Grant and the great state in which he was born”. NBC, he said, was guilty of “as usual, dishonest reporting. Even mainstream media embarrassed!”

NBC News did not reply to a request for comment and the tweet remained live. But on Sunday afternoon another tweet contained a correction and the full video of Trump’s remarks about the generals. Trump tweeted his thanks.

Trump began his historical discourse by praising another Ohioan, William McKinley, the assassinated 25th president who Trump said “has not been properly recognised, OK … in terms of being smart on tariffs”.

The video in the NBC tweet picked up his next remarks, in which he said Ohio “also gave you a general who was incredible. He drank a little bit too much. You know who I’m talking about, right?”

That was Grant, whose well-documented drinking problem did not stop him rising to lead the Union army, defeat the Confederacy and, in 1869, become president.

Trump then said: “So Robert E Lee was a great general and Abraham Lincoln developed a phobia. He couldn’t beat Robert E Lee. He was going crazy.

“I don’t know if you know this story but Robert E Lee was winning battle after battle after battle, and Abraham Lincoln came home and he said, ‘I can’t beat Robert E Lee.’ And he had all these generals, they looked great, they were top of their class at West Point, they were the greatest people. There’s only one problem. They didn’t know how the hell to win, they didn’t know how to fight. They didn’t know how.”

The video tweeted by NBC ended there. Trump went on to say: “And one day, it was looking really bad. And Lincoln just said, you [Grant] – hardly knew his name – and they said, ‘Don’t take him. He’s got a drinking problem. And Lincoln said, ‘I don’t care what problem he has, you guys aren’t winning. And his name was Grant. General Grant.”

Grant “went in and knocked the hell out of everyone”, Trump said, adding: “Man, was he a good general. And he’s finally being recognised as a great general.”

Grant’s reputation has long been the subject of contention, both for the high cost of “knocking the hell out of everyone” – particularly in the Wilderness campaign against Lee in 1864 – and for his record in the White House, in two terms marked by corruption scandals and an ultimately failed effort to defeat racism in the south.

But he has increasingly come to be viewed as one of the better presidents. Last year saw the publication of a major biography by Ron Chernow, the author of the life of Alexander Hamilton which inspired the smash-hit musical.

Perhaps fuelled by Chernow, the 2018 Presidential Greatness Rankings, drawn up by the American Political Science Association, saw Grant climb seven places to 21st. Trump was 44th and last. Though the billionaire is the 45th president, Grover Cleveland’s separate stints in the White House mean only 44 names appear. Lincoln was rated No1. Barack Obama, Trump’s predecessor, was up 10 places to eighth.

Lee’s reputation has been the subject of intensified dispute since summer 2017, when white supremacists marched in Charlottesville, Virginia, ostensibly to protest the removal of a statue to a general who fought against his own government in defence of slavery.

Trump’s equivocal reaction to the march, which led to the death of a counterprotester, caused controversy that has never truly dissipated. The president has also spoken against the removal of statues to Confederate generals and leaders.