Trump sticks to dangerous helicopter ride tale, Brown says it never happened

By James Oliphant

(Reuters) – Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump on Friday insisted he was with former San Francisco Mayor Willie in a fantastical story of nearly dying in a helicopter crash, despite Brown denying the incident ever happened.

During a press conference on Thursday on a variety of topics, Trump related a tale of almost going down in a helicopter with Willie Brown, who briefly dated Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris several decades ago.

“I went down in a helicopter with him,” Trump said. “We thought maybe this is the end. We were in a helicopter going to a certain location together, and there was an emergency landing. This was not a pleasant landing, and Willie was, he was a little concerned.”

Trump also asserted Willie Brown told him “terrible things” about Harris.

Brown, a longtime Democratic power broker who also served as speaker of the California State Assembly, told the San Francisco Chronicle after Trump’s press conference that he was never in a helicopter with the former president.

“You would have known if I had gone down on a helicopter with Trump,” he told the newspaper. He also denied that he had ever said anything disparaging about Harris to Trump.

While president, Trump toured fire-ravaged portions of California in 2018 by helicopter with then-California Governor Jerry Brown, NBC News reported. A representative for former Governor Brown told the New York Times there was no emergency landing and Harris never was discussed during the flight.

Republicans have insinuated that Brown is in part responsible for Harris’ rise in politics although, the two broke up in the mid-1990s and Harris did not win her first election until 2002. While the two were dating, Brown appointed Harris, then a young prosecutor, to two well-paying jobs on state boards.

On Friday, Trump dug in, insisting in posts on his Truth Social platform that his helicopter ride had been with Willie Brown, who is Black, not Jerry Brown, who is White, and that it has occurred in New Jersey, not California.

“There were “Logs,” Maintenance Records, and Witnesses. There was also a story on “Willie and Me,” Trump said.

He did not provide any of the evidence he referred to in the post. The Trump campaign did not immediately respond to a request to share the evidence Trump mentioned.

Trump also said he would “probably” sue the New York Times over its coverage of his comments on the helicopter story, according to a Times story on Friday. Trump disparaged the newspaper on Truth Social, attacking its reporter Maggie Haberman as “Maggot Hagermann.”

The Times did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The Harris campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Friday about the apparent mix-up.

The current governor of California, Gavin Newsom, who was a passenger on the 2018 flyover with Jerry Brown, also said Trump’s near-death experience never occurred.

“I call complete B.S.,” he told the Times.

When 81-year-old President Joe Biden was still the Democratic candidate in the Nov. 5 election, Trump, 78, frequently mocked his opponent’s mental acuity and offered to take a cognitive test, arguing Biden was too infirm to be president.

Biden has since been replaced atop the ticket by the 59-year-old Harris, forcing Trump to scramble to find new lines of attack.