A day after falsely suggesting there was an immigration-related security incident in Sweden, US President Donald Trump on Sunday said his comment was based on a TV report he had seen.
The president, who in his first weeks in office has tried to tighten US borders sharply for national security reasons, on Saturday told a rally that Sweden was having serious problems with immigrants.
“You look at what’s happening last night in Sweden,” Trump said. “Sweden. Who would believe this? Sweden. They took in large numbers. They’re having problems like they never thought possible.”
No incident occurred in Sweden and the country’s baffled government asked the US Department of State to explain.
“My statement as to what’s happening in Sweden was in reference to a story that was broadcast on @FoxNews concerning immigrants & Sweden,” Trump tweeted on Sunday.
Fox News, a US channel that has been cited favorably by Trump, on Friday ran a report about alleged migrant-related crime problems in the country.
A White House spokeswoman on Sunday told reporters that Trump had been referring generally to rising crime, not a specific incident in the Scandinavian country.
Sweden’s crime rate has fallen since 2005, official statistics show, even as it has taken in hundreds of thousands of refugees and migrants from war-torn countries such as Syria and Iraq.
Trump’s comment confounded Stockholm.
“We are trying to get clarity,” Swedish Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokeswoman Catarina Axelsson said.
Sweden’s embassy in the US repeated Trump’s tweet about having seen the Fox report.
“We look forward to informing the US administration about Swedish immigration and integration policies,” the embassy said.
Trump has been widely criticized in the media for making assertions with little or no supporting evidence.
He has said more than 3 million people voted fraudulently in the US election, which officials say is false, and incorrectly stated that he won by the most decisive margin in decades.
Swedish Minister of Foreign Affairs Margot Wallstrom on Saturday appeared to respond to Trump by posting on Twitter an excerpt of a speech in which she said democracy and diplomacy “require us to respect science, facts and the media.”
Her predecessor was less circumspect.
“Sweden? Terror attack? What has he been smoking? Questions abound,” former Swedish minister of foreign affairs Carl Bildt wrote on Twitter.
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