According to a new report in The Washington Post, President Donald Trump personally called acting National Park Service director Michael T. Reynolds the morning after his inauguration and ordered him to produce photos of the crowd on the Washington Mall that would serve to counter reports that fewer people had attended than four and eight years earlier. According to “three individuals who have knowledge of the conversation,” the Post reported that Trump “also expressed anger over a retweet sent from the agency’s account, in which side-by-side photographs showed far fewer people at his swearing-in than had shown up to see Barack Obama’s inaugural in 2009.” That same morning, White House press secretary Sean Spicer castigated the media for what the administration viewed as false reports about the size of Trump’s crowd. “This was the largest audience to ever witness an inauguration. Period. Both in person and around the globe,” he said, offering no evidence to back up that demonstrably false claim.
