David M Jackson

USA TODAY

A top aide to President Trump said the new White House is using new metrics to assess the size of Trump's inauguration: "alternative facts."

Kellyanne Conway, counselor to the president, told NBC's Meet the Press that the flap over crowd sizes at the inauguration symbolize what she called negative coverage of the new president.

While aerial photos showed that Trump drew a smaller crowd to his inaugural address than President Obama did, White House press secretary Sean Spicer told reporters Saturday: "This was the largest audience to ever witness an inauguration — period — both in person and around the globe."

When Meet the Press host Chuck Todd described that claim as a "falsehood," Conway said: "You're saying it's a falsehood and Sean Spicer, our press secretary, gave alternative facts to that."

Todd shot back, however: "Alternative facts are not facts. They are falsehoods."

"I don't think you can prove those numbers one way or another. There's no way to really quantify crowds," Conway said.

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