To Good To Check, Sean Hannity’s tale of a Trump rescue (FAIL)

[geronl]

“The Trump campaign has confirmed to Hannity.com that Mr. Trump did indeed send his plane to make two trips from North Carolina to Miami, Florida to transport over 200 Gulf War Marines back home.”
— quote in article titled “200 Stranded Marines Needed A Plane Ride Home, Here’s How Donald Trump Responded,” Sean Hannity Show website, May 19, 2016

It seemed like such a sweet story — Donald Trump sending his personal plane down to Camp Lejeune, N.C., when 200 Marines were stranded after fighting in the 1991 Persian Gulf War. At least that is the story that Sean Hannity of Fox News has touted on his website for several months.

But a reader, Lazer Cohen of Brooklyn, was suspicious and asked The Fact Checker to check it out.

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The Facts

The Hannity story mostly relied on the recollections of Cpl. Ryan Stickney, who was a squad leader in a Marine Corps Reserve antitank (TOW) company that was called up for duty for the 1990-91 conflict that took place after Iraq invaded Kuwait. After five weeks of airstrikes, the United States and its allies ousted Iraqi forces in a 100-hour ground assault.

The command chronology shows that 209 officers and Marines of the TOW Company (part of the 8th Tank Battalion for Operation Desert Shield) were activated on Nov. 26, 1990. The company arrived in Saudi Arabia on Dec. 22 and served through the end of March, before returning to Camp Lejeune. Stickney is listed as receiving a certificate of commendation.

After a few weeks in Camp Lejeune, the part-time troops were scheduled to return to their base in Broward County. An article in the Sun-Sentinel newspaper on the April 22 homecoming reported that it had been “marred by flight delays,” forcing well-wishers to wait for hours in the sun. The article said the Marines arrived on two flights, one at noon and one after 5 p.m.

“Stickney recalls being told that a mistake had been made within the logistics unit and that an aircraft wasn’t available to take the Marines home on their scheduled departure date,” Hannity.com reported. But then Trump supposedly came to the rescue: “The way the story was told to us was that Mr. Trump found out about it and sent the airline down to take care of us,” Stickney said.

Our reader was suspicious because of the language “recalls being told.” That sounds more like a rumor than any confirmation.

Moreover, take a close look at the photograph. That was not Trump’s private plane at the time. That’s a Boeing 727 jet that was part of a Trump Shuttle fleet — an airline that Trump briefly owned before it was essentially seized by the banks because he failed to make payments on his loans. It had a white fuselage.

--- [snip]

So some of those extra planes were contracted out to the U.S. military to ferry personnel in the United States during Operations Desert Shield/Storm in 1990-1991. Lt. Gen. Vernon J. Kondra, now retired, was in charge of all military airlift operations. He said that relying on commercial carriers freed up the military cargo aircraft for equipment transport.

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excerpted

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2016/08/11/too-good-to-check-sean-hannitys-tale-of-a-trump-rescue/?tid=sm_fb

In other words it had little to nothing to do with Trump. There was a contract with the military and that is that.

[beandog]

Hannity, who has never been the brightest bulb, has become the Donalds hand puppet.  He really sounds like a love struck little school girl now.

[geronl]

He also boasted of on-site day care for employees, which does not appear to be true

[geronl]

Great article. I posted it last night also:  http://www.gopbriefingroom.com/index.php/topic,220292.0.html

The deceit that oozes from anything trump is fouling our country.

oops.

[GrouchoTex]

Hannity, if he really wanted to, could have checked all this out, or had someone at Fox do it for him, but I don't believe he really cared whether it was true or not.
Like Brietbart using fake photos of rallies, Hannity is now willing to use lies and distortions to prop up Trump, all the while, blaming us if Trump loses, as some sort of "sore losers".
Hannity, if you lie for your candidate, what else will you lie for?
Looks like you and Trump both can now be judged by the company you keep.
I guess that's something.........