WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration has lauded its revamped website America.gov as a way to simplify Americans’ access to information and services scattered across a plethora of agency sites, but President Donald Trump probably won't like some of the answers his new site says are sourced from government information.
Asking the site — which says it’s sourced via artificial intelligence from “official government sources” — questions about who won the 2020 election or about the name of the federal department that operates out of the Pentagon yields answers contrary to those Trump himself frequently proclaims.
As Trump was still speaking at Tuesday’s launch event, however, the site began modifying its answers. Asked again about the 2020 election, it replied that it couldn’t answer “political questions," a response it also gave to inquiries about whether Trump had been impeached or convicted of felony charges.
The Associated Press asked about:
The 2020 presidential election
“Official federal sources do not show that widespread fraud changed the 2020 presidential election outcome. Isolated election crimes did occur and have been prosecuted.”
Since Trump, a Republican, lost the 2020 election to Democrat Joe Biden, he has repeatedly falsely claimed that victory was “stolen” from him and asserted that widespread fraud occurred. Repeated audits and recounts found no significant fraud in the presidential election, and Trump’s own administration said the election was clean.
Trump running for president in 2028
“The 22nd Amendment says that no person shall be elected President more than twice. Donald J. Trump has already been elected twice (2016 and 2024). I am not giving legal advice.”
Trump has frequently suggested he wants to seek a third term, posting about mounting another campaign, donning 2028 caps and discussing ways to make it happen — even as he’s acknowledged the Constitution prohibits it. He had only been back in the White House for a couple of months when he told NBC News, “There are methods which you could” use to seek a third term.
The Pentagon
“The Pentagon is the headquarters of the Department of Defense.”
Last year, Trump signed an executive order aimed at rebranding the Department of Defense as the Department of War, complaining that the Department of Defense’s name was “woke.”
Human action as cause of climate change
“Federal climate-science pages say recent warming is largely from human greenhouse-gas emissions, mainly burning fossil fuels. Earth’s climate has also changed for natural reasons over long periods.”
Trump, who has called climate change a “hoax,” previously issued an executive order that directed the Environmental Protection Agency to submit a report on “the legality and continuing applicability” of the endangerment finding. Conservatives and some congressional Republicans have long sought to undo what they consider overly restrictive and economically damaging rules to limit greenhouse gases that cause global warming.
Presidential salaries
The chatbot said that “some presidents have declined to keep that pay,” mentioning Trump but listing George Washington, Herbert Hoover and John F. Kennedy as refusing their salaries before Trump.
During his remarks Tuesday, Trump, a real estate mogul who took in about $1.2 billion from various crypto holdings last year, said he was the first U.S. president to forgo a salary, something that he has said before.
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Kinnard reported from Columbia, S.C.
