President Donald Trump has lashed out at The New York Times once again after the outlet’s chief White House correspondent called his mental health and stability into question.
“HAVE THEY NO SHAME? HAVE THEY NO SENSE OF DECENCY?” the president posted on Truth Social Monday evening after NYT veteran political reporter Peter Baker cast doubt over his “erratic behavior and extreme comments.”
Trump, who once memorably branded himself a “Very Stable Genius”, didn’t respond directly to Baker’s article, instead taking aim at the paper’s coverage of his war in Iran.
Trump has previously described The NYT as “seditious, perhaps even treasonous” for running an op-ed that questioned his health.
“For those people that still read The Failing New York Times and, despite the fact that Iran has been totally OBLITERATED, Militarily, and otherwise, you would think that Iran is actually winning or, at the very least, doing quite well,” the president said Monday on Truth Social.
“But that’s not true, and The New York Times knows that it’s FAKE NEWS! When does this Corrupt Media Outlet apologize for their LIES and horrible actions against me, my supporters, and our Country itself!”
It wasn’t clear exactly which story in particular the president may have been reacting to in his Monday post, if any. The Independent has reached out to the White House for comment.
Late last year, the president lashed out after another New York Times report found his level of activity over his first 10 months back in office to be significantly lower than it was during his first term.
The report at the time analyzed Trump’s official schedules and compared events during his first and second terms and found his official engagements fell by almost 40 percent. The president’s public appearances are a matter of public record, yet Trump accused The NYT of fabricating its analysis to harm him politically.
He also then accused veteran White House reporter Katie Rogers of being “assigned to only write bad things” about him and called her “a third rate reporter who is ugly, both inside and out.”
Baker’s story Monday was significant in that the outlet has previously been accused of “sane-washing” Trump’s long history of erratic behavior, bizarre outbursts, furious rants and vindictive insults.
Monday’s article was a roundup of recent concerns from not only Democrats and committed Trump foes but “retired generals, diplomats and foreign officials” as well as Republicans and “onetime allies of the president.”
Former GOP representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, once among Trump’s most die-hard outriders, described his threat to annihilate Iran as “insanity”, while right-wing influencer Candace Owens called him “a genocidal lunatic.”
Trump’s former White House lawyer Ty Cobb said he was “clearly insane”. Former CIA director John Brennan said the 25th Amendment to the Constitution was designed with people like Trump “in mind.” And at least 87 Democratic members of Congress demanded his cabinet invoke the 25th, calling the president “deranged” and “unstable”.
Jamie Raskin, the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, asked the White House physician to immediately perform a comprehensive cognitive assessment, describing Trump as “increasingly incoherent, volatile, profane, deranged, and threatening.”
Baker, for his part, wrote: “A series of disjointed, hard-to-follow and sometimes-profane statements… have left many with the impression of a deranged autocrat mad with power.”
Many commentators online viewed that language as significant. “A few months short of the president’s 80th birthday and the nation’s paper of record is openly wondering whether he’s nuts,” wrote Washington Post global economics correspondent David J. Lynch on X.
“He has lost Peter Baker. I repeat, he has lost Peter Baker,” wrote independent legal journalist Chris Geidner on Bluesky.
Others mocked the article for admitting what they felt had long been obvious.
“Now they tell us lol,” wrote Ryan Cooper of the progressive American Prospect magazine.
