New documents have emerged which appear to strongly suggest the official pictures of President Trump’s inauguration were manipulated by a government photographer in order to give the impression the crowd was bigger than its actuality.
Some very selective cropping was apparently used in order to hide empty space where the crowd ended. The report claims that on his first day of presidency, Trump requested images that were cut especially to enhance the size of the crowd, after allegedly being angered that the turnout was less than that of his predecessor, Obama.
The Guardian reportedly obtained the documents through the inspector general of the US Interior Department, gaining access under the Freedom of Information Act. It’s also claimed that at-the-time White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer made repeated calls to locate the “more flattering” photographs.
There’s no clarification as to whether the manipulated images were ever released to the public.
At the time of the inauguration, the National Park Service (NPS) retweeted various tweets purportedly showing pictures of Trump’s significantly smaller crowd. An anonymous NPS rep recalls, however, that although it was insinuated, a request to specifically crop the photos was never issued.
It’s said the official NPS photographer “edited the inauguration photographs to make them look more symmetrical by cropping out the sky and cropping out the bottom where the crowd ended... He said he did so to show that there had been more of a crowd.”
The Guardian has more on this story.
Lead image credit: Ludovic Gauthier on Unsplash.
And in other news surprises absolutely nobody and doesn't actually matter...
Everyone is out having a fun Saturday and Jack Alexander is at home writing an article about the crowd size at Trump's inauguration from two years ago.
Sad, isn’t it?
an investigative report shows the president is lying about facts... sorry to ruin your fun saturday but we need to talk about ethics and photography here.
And THESE are the facts that we want to argue about? THIS is where we're deciding to draw the battle lines? An administration's lies about the number of attendees at an event?
I'm sorry, but this is insane... And this is coming from someone who is counting the days until Trump is out of office (or if there is a God, impeached).
Really? You can count that high? :-)
It's not only this, we're talking about a whole bunch of issues surrounding the truthfulness of his administration. just look at how many of his administration have been sentenced already, him lying about payments to a porn star, and lying about collusion. the amount of energy he and this administration put into lying about the inauguration is ridiculous, that's tax payer money wasted. i'm a little pissed about how my tax dollars are spent, i'm hoping you would too
There's a big difference between lying and being wrong. I'll assume you're just wrong about half your comment; it would be rude to say you're lying.
Sorry buddy, he lied. Here's him saying he knows nothing about the payment then later admitting that he knew about it. In the inauguration he says his crowd was bigger, when really it wasn't. It's surprising that you're ready to let the guy off the hook. Facts are facts, no room for alternative ones here.
https://www.nbcnews.com/video/trump-denies-stormy-daniels-payment-120366...
Neither you or I know all the details regarding the payments. I'm prepared to give him the benefit of the doubt and in either case, he did nothing wrong. And for the last time, there's a big difference between lying and being wrong. I already explained my willingness to forgive and overlook things.
By the way, I was in San Francisco about six weeks ago. I thought the "poop on the sidewalks" thing was overblown until my wife accidently kicked a pile, a couple blocks from the trolley staging area! :-( Aside from that, I thought it was a beautiful place. :-)
I would do the same but one must acknowledge that a lie has been committed and own up to it, then I would be willing to forgive. In this case, he lied about the payments and the jury is still out on whether it was "wrong." in my mind it is, especially if he was attacking another candidate's integrity with payments, taxes, and so on.
Poop on the sidewalks here is a real thing. That's the least of our worries, the needles are the biggest.
I didn't see any needles. :-)
This is not a political site. It's a photography site. What's ridiculous here is that this is being posted to a photography site since it's a question of ethics and journalism—not photography. What's more ridiculous than the amount of resources the administration is spending lying about inauguration attendance is the amount of collective resources we're spending to debunk the lie about the inauguration attendance.
You've got families separated from their children, an administration with ridiculous levels of turn-over among the senior staff, people tied to the president going on trial and getting convicted, numerous government positions that have not yet been filled despite us being two years into this administration, a president that was pretty much going golfing every weekend along with his entire entourage and security detachment for a while there, the start of the trade war with China, the fortification of China's regional hold in the Pacific which diminishes our sphere of influence, US citizens being detained by immigration authorities who are skeptical of their citizenship, an administration too cowardly to call out neo-Nazis and white supremacists for being the disgusting hate groups that they are, the alienation of many of our closest allied nations, etc.
But while all of this is going on, we're going to talk about how many people showed up to an inauguration or whether he paid some porn star to STFU? At this point, WHO THE HELL CARES ABOUT THE NUMBER OF PEOPLE AT THE INAUGURATION!? A waste of tax payer money? Do you seriously think it cost any significant amount of tax payer money to fabricate such an image? Do you have any idea how much it costs for the president to make a single trip to his resort for a round of golf? Do you know what a single bomb costs? A crap photo cloning job doesn't even register as a blip when it comes to government spending.
And who cares about the porn star thing? Yes, he's a disgusting pig of a human being. Is anyone particularly surprised that a guy with tons of money that did business in New York real estate for decades is a terrible person? As a native New Yorker, I would be genuinely surprised if he made all that money in this city and wasn't a horrible, rotten person to his very core.
Working hard tying in any photography angle to bash Trump.
I’m tired of hearing people cry about him already, the job market seems to disagree with the sentiment. Not to mention the stock market.
Hey Fstoppers, hope you stop this nonsense, please keep your personal dodo off here, I just want to learn about photography. Might have to leave you guys, not that you care, But keep it simple, grow up guys
The post again , your close to showing a “fake article” not knowing if its true, the word suggest....I suggest Fstoppers is putting personalities over principles.....Keeep it simple, Teach me, show me gadgets, This is a new low for you guys.
This fstoppers story is gonna be uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuge.
ABsolute BS. Terrible article
Surprised to see that this site is rife full of Trump apologists. It's an article about ethics, get over it.
Do photographers have to be Democrats?
Yes it is, but we're not politicians or journalists. The only ethics involved here as far as the photographer and retoucher are concerned is whether they delivered the services promised to the paying client.
I imagine ignorant people are surprised a lot!
Way to go FStoppers! Use any angle you can to anger and alienate half your audience! Don't just stick to the art of photography or anything!
The article is fair and true. The problem is people, on both sides to be fair but mostly liberals (not necessarily Democrats), with no life and need to trash talk others to feel better about themselves. Unfortunately, it doesn't work. They still have to live with who they are.