‘Superstar’ Grenell Tells Politico What To Do With Their ‘False’ Story After ‘Scary’ Response

Richard Grenell — the U.S. Ambassador to Germany who President Trump has praised as a “superstar” in helping him “break the deep state” during his recently ended three-month run as acting Director of National Intelligence — is engaged in a contentious social media feud with Politico over a report about him supposedly planning to join the Trump campaign that Grenell has slammed as utterly “false.”

“Grenell to join Trump campaign,” Politico announced Tuesday. The report begins:

U.S. Ambassador to Germany Ric Grenell is set to join President Donald Trump’s 2020 campaign amid a broader shakeup that saw the promotion of two other campaign officials on Tuesday, according to two people familiar with the matter. …

A person familiar with the move said Grenell will take a senior role inside the Trump campaign, where he will be involved in fundraising and strategy. It was not immediately clear what his title will be or whether he will work from the campaign’s Northern Virginia headquarters. Grenell was seen entering the White House on Tuesday afternoon, shortly after the Trump campaign announced its promotion of senior political adviser Bill Stepien to serve as deputy campaign manager.

“Fake news. Do you even check before writing?” Grenell tweeted in response to a post by Politico National Security Correspondent Natasha Bertrand Tuesday. “What has happened to Washington DC media?!” 

The since-deleted tweet by Bertrand read: “News — Richard Grenell, who was until today the acting Director of National Intelligence, is joining the Trump campaign in a senior role focused on strategy and fundraising.”

In response to Grenell’s tweet, Politico’s VP of Marketing & Communications Brad Dayspring wrote: “Yes. In fact, beyond the multiple high-level sources who confirmed the story, we reached out to you several times prior to publishing. You didn’t respond. We welcome your comment and encourage you to point out, on record, what specific facts you believe to be incorrect.”

Grenell responded by condemning Politico’s “scary” response to multiple denials: “The entire story isn’t true. And your response is scary — you don’t believe the campaign denial nor mine. But claim you have some anonymous source. Do you realize how ridiculous you sound?”

Following that post, Dayspring responded: “Thanks for finally getting back to us. Let’s go point by point. Please state *SPECIFICALLY* what you believe to be untrue. Don’t paint in broad strokes, let’s have this discussion. Is your next job going to be on the Trump campaign? Yes or no?”

Grenell responded by making clear he had no interest in a further “discussion” and offering Politico some advice on how to handle its doubly denied story. “No,” he tweeted. “Delete the story, it’s false.”

Grenell later called out Twitter, which on Tuesday began to “fact-check” President Trump’s tweets. “Why isn’t [Twitter] fact checking Politico? This story is wrong. She was told it’s wrong and yet she keeps it up,” he wrote in reference to Bertrand’s since-deleted post.

In an update to its initial report, Politico acknowledged the denials from Grenell and the Trump campaign:

After this story was published, Grenell on Twitter called the report “fake news” and said “the entire story isn’t true.” Prior to publication, he hadn’t responded to a request for comment. The Trump campaign didn’t respond to multiple requests for comment, but campaign manager Brad Parscale also denied the report on Twitter after publication.

Grenell’s posts below: