President Donald Trump lamented an incident of “triple sabotage” at the United Nations on Tuesday and called for punishment for any alleged perpetrators.
Trump delivered an address at the U.N. and said he endured audio problems, a teleprompter malfunction, and an escalator mishap before he delivered his speech.
He wrote on Truth Social that it was “amazing” that he and the first lady didn’t fall when an escalator stopped while they were riding it.
“This was absolutely sabotage, as noted by a day’s earlier ‘post’ in The London Times that said U.N. workers ‘joked about turning off an escalator.’ The people that did it should be arrested!” Trump said, referring to an article in The Times.
The article noted, “U.N. staff members have joked that they may turn off the escalators and elevators and simply tell him they ran out of money, so he has to walk up the stairs.”
Trump then noted the three mishaps, saying his speech received “fantastic reviews.”
He also claimed that the first lady could not “hear a word” of Trump’s speech, suggesting audio problems with the president’s speech.
“This wasn’t a coincidence; this was triple sabotage at the U.N.. They ought to be ashamed of themselves. I’m sending a copy of this letter to the Secretary General, and I demand an immediate investigation. No wonder the United Nations hasn’t been able to do the job that they were put in existence to do. All security tapes at the escalator should be saved, especially the emergency stop button. The Secret Service is involved,” Trump concluded.
It’s unclear who committed the “sabotage” Trump alleged or what crimes they would be charged with.
U.N. Ambassador Mike Waltz cited two instances of sabotage that Trump did, but did not cite audio problems consistent with the president’s explanation. Waltz said the third problem was “interruptions of his speech with Portuguese interpretation,” which compromised “the delivery of America’s message on the world stage.”
The U.N. said the escalator incident happened because a person had gone ahead of Trump and accidentally set off a safety mechanism on the escalator, causing it to stop. As for the teleprompter, the U.N. told the BBC that the Trump team was operating the teleprompter at the time, bringing their own equipment and plugging it into the U.N.’s system.
TRUMP BRINGS BOX OFFICE AND URGENCY TO UN
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said on Tuesday that she would “personally see to” the punishment of those involved.
“If we find these were U.N. staffers who were purposely trying to literally trip up the president and the first lady, there better be accountability for those people, and I will personally see to it,” she said.
