Lawrence O’Donnell Says He “Made an Error in Judgement” Reporting a Trump

On Tuesday, Lawrence O’Donnell reported on The Last Word that Trump‘s financial records show that some of his loans have Russian co-signers but the next day said that he repeated statements from a single source that weren’t ready for reporting and that he did not go through the network’s

“rigorous verification and standards process” before repeating it, and that “had it gone through that process, I would not have been permitted to report it.”

He opened his show Wednesday night saying

“Tonight, we are retracting the story. We don’t know whether the information is inaccurate, but the fact is we do know it wasn’t ready for broadcast, and for that I apologize.”
Last night I made an error in judgment by reporting an item about the president’s finances that didn’t go through our rigorous verification and standards process. I shouldn’t have reported it and I was wrong to discuss it on the air.”
Saying ‘if true’ as I discussed the information was simply not good enough.
I should not have said it on air or posted it on Twitter. I was wrong to do so.”

O’Donnell reported Tuesday that the unnamed source close to Deutsche Bank revealed to him that loans taken out by Trump were co-signed by

“Russian billionaires.”

Later in the show, O’Donnell returned to the subject and said the claim was

“going to need a lot more verification before it’s a provable fact.”

Responding to O’Donnell’s reporting, an attorney for Trump sent a letter on Wednesday to NBC News calling the segment

“false and defamatory” demanding the host “immediately and prominently retract, correct and apologize.”

Attorney Charles Harder, added that

“the only borrowers under these loans are Trump entities, and Mr. Trump is the only guarantor.”

O’Donnell’s reporting referred to tax returns and financial records tied to Trump that Deutsche Bank said Tuesday it possessed. The bank’s statement was the latest development related to an effort by House Democrats to obtain the president’s financial information.

O’Donnell on Wednesday night’s show referenced that the president’s attorneys demanded a retraction.

Just in: Attorney for @realDonaldTrump sends demand for retraction, corrctn, and apology to @nbc over segment of @Lawrence program last nite in which he said “Russian oligarchs” co-signed Deutsche Bank loans to Trump. Letter says that statement is “false and defamatory.” Letter: pic.twitter.com/HY0ZRAES5i
— Paul Farhi (@farhip) August 28, 2019