“Sadly, they and others are Fake News, and the public is just beginning to figure it out!" President Donald Trump tweeted of NBC. | Richard Drew/AP Trump continues attack on 'fake news' NBC

President Donald Trump lashed out again Friday morning at NBC News, blaming it and other outlets for disseminating what he labeled “fake news” that he claimed the public is learning to recognize.

“Sadly, they and others are Fake News, and the public is just beginning to figure it out!” Trump wrote Friday morning, linking to a post from former Fox News host Bill O’Reilly, who wrote on his own Twitter account that “the President will not be able to impact licenses, but he is doing major damage to the @nbc brand.”


Earlier this week, Trump complained about and disputed an NBC News report that he had sought a 10-fold increase in the nation’s nuclear arsenal, putting the network’s news division on the level of CNN, perhaps his least favorite media outlet.

Trump suggested the network’s broadcast license be challenged, a threat that would be difficult if not impossible to follow through on because NBC affiliates, not NBC itself, own the majority of the relevant broadcast licenses.

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It was the second time in as many weeks that Trump responded to reporting from NBC’s news division. The network reported last week that Secretary of State Rex Tillerson had considered resigning last summer and had called Trump a “moron” after a meeting with the president’s national security team and members of the cabinet.

Tillerson himself held an unannounced news conference to say that he had never considered resigning, but he did not outright deny that he had called the president a “moron.” State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert denied the “moron” reporting at her daily press briefing hours after Tillerson’s news conference.