Barron Trump Autism Video YouTuber Yanks Clip, Issues Apology

The man who posted a YouTube video suggesting that 10-year-old Barron Trump might be autistic pulled the video and issued an apology on Tuesday, a day after being threatened with legal action by Barron’s mother, future First Lady Melania Trump.

In a video apology posted Tuesday, James Hunter called his video “false, defamatory and malicious.”

“In the video, I suggested Barron Trump might suffer from autism. That is in fact 100 percent false,” Hunter said. “It was incredibly irresponsible of me to diagnose Barron Trump using a selection of misleading videos.”

Also Read: Barron Trump Autism Video Poster Says He'll Remove Clip

Hunter added, “Many of the videos I used showed Barron Trump behaving like any normal kid would at 3 a.m. I falsely correlated him trying to stay aware and occasionally doing quirky things, with him suffering from autism. This was incredibly foolish of me.”

Hunter added that, while he intended the video to be an anti-bullying effort, “Unfortunately, I completely misdiagnosed a person and ended up making a video that was false, defamatory and malicious.

“I retract every single statement I made in that horrendous video, and want to sincerely apologize to the Trump family, especially to Melania and Barron Trump,” he continued.

Also Read: Melania Trump Threatens Lawsuit Over Barron Trump Autism Video

The retraction comes just a day after Melania Trump threatened legal action over the video. According to TMZ, she sent a letter stating that the video — which cites supposed signs of autism, such as clapping without slapping hands — is wrong,

Trump’s attorney, Charles Harder, told TheWrap in a statement Monday, “A video was posted at YouTube recently speculating that Barron might be autistic. He is not. The video includes the hashtag “StopTheBullying” but yet the video itself is bullying by making false statements and speculation about a 10-year-old boy for the purpose of harassing him and his parents. The online bullying of children, including Barron Trump, should end now.”

Also Read: George Takei Rips Donald Trump Over Flag-Burning Comment

The video had been viewed over 1.2 million times on YouTube since being uploaded on Nov. 11.

“Donald Trump’s youngest son Barron Trump might be autistic, and it’s time for people to stop bullying him for his ‘strange’ behavior. Let’s follow Melania Trump and #StopTheBullying,” the video description reads.

The seven-minute video points to several of Barron’s mannerisms, captured on camera during the few times he’s appeared on TV, as evidence he may be autistic.

View the full apology in the video.

10 Times Donald Trump Shared Fake News (Photos)

Donald Trump is the country's most prominent spreader of fake news. Here are ten unquestionably fake news stories he has shared.
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In 2009, Trump helped create fake news when the USA Network and WWE falsely reported that Trump was planning to buy "Monday Night RAW." It turned out that it was all part of a wrestling storyline.
Trump spent years demanding that President Obama produce his birth certificate and other papers in response to false e-mails that Obama was a Kenyan-born Muslim. He finally admitted Obama was born in this country in September, then accused Hillary Clinton of starting the lies about Obama.
In December 2011, Trump said President Obama "issued a statement for Kwanza but failed to issue one for Christmas." That was provably false. (This photo is from 2014.)
Trump said in 2015 that "thousands and thousands of people were cheering" in Jersey City, N.J. when the World Trade Center fell on Sept. 11, 2011. Although some radio stations and websites reported celebrations in nearby Paterson, N.J., the city denied the reports.
In February 2016, Trump entertained conspiracy theories that Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia was murdered when he said he was found with "a pillow on his face." Alex Jones' InfoWars had earlier reported on suggestions Scalia was killed. But the owner of the ranch where Scalia died later clarified that he did not have a pillow over his face.
In June 2016, Trump tweeted a photo that purported to show a family of African-Americans who supported him. But they told BuzzFeed they definitely did not.
Twitter
In another case of Trump creating the fake news, he scored 22,000 retweets on Election Day by posting, "Just out according to @CNN: 'Utah officials report voting machine problems across entire country.'" But it was just one county. No R.
On Nov. 10, Trump tweeted that post-Election Day protestors were “professional,” but a professional fake-news writer, Paul Horner, admitted that he had invented a story about protesters being paid.

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After saying for months before election day that the vote would be rigged, Trump won. He subsequently said “million of people” voted illegally. A guy on Twitter who had tweeted that 3 million voted illegally declined to provide any source. Trump has continued to make baseless claims about millions of illegal voters since he took office.
YouTube
Let's give credit where its due: On Dec. 6, Trump fired one of his transition team staffers for tweeting a fake news story that led to an armed confrontation in a Washington, DC pizza restaurant. The issue became known as "pizzagate."
On his first full day in office, Trump visited the Central Intelligence Agency and claimed 1.5 million people attended his inauguration. The New York Times said that photographs "disproved" that number. Vox did a deep dive into why Trump's numbers appeared to be off. And a Texas NHL team, among others, made fun of him.
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