President Donald Trump swiftly withdrew his criticism of a reporter on Monday after initially dismissing her question as “fake news.”

Trump made the comments while speaking briefly with reporters before departing for Kansas, where he was scheduled to campaign for Republican candidates ahead of the midterm elections. A journalist asked him about reports that French President Emmanuel Macron had blamed him for violent riots that had spread across France.

“I think that’s fake news,” Trump replied before asking the reporter, “Who are you with?”

“No sir,” she answered. “I’m Mary Margaret [Olohan] with The Daily Wire.”

Trump’s tone appeared to soften immediately. Smiling, he responded: “Oh, Daily Wire’s good. Sorry, The Daily Wire’s good.”

He then addressed the question, saying Macron “is a friend of mine.”

“I told him a long time ago, ‘You’re making a big mistake in France,’” Trump said. “‘You’re letting everybody from the world come in.’”

“The whole world was coming in, and you know, Paris is going to be a Muslim city very soon—and that wasn’t the deal. That wasn’t the deal.”

“I told Emmanuel, you should close up your borders, and let’s see, I’ve known him for probably eight or nine years. I told him as soon as I met him, ‘You’re making a big mistake,’” the president continued.

“We closed our borders, he didn’t. And you know what? His borders are a problem.”

“But Emmanuel should have closed his borders a long time ago,” Trump concluded. “I told him to do it.”

Trump had made similar comments on his Truth Social platform over the weekend, as shocking images showed masked rioters setting vehicles on fire and looting stores.

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On Sunday, he declared: “France is burning!”

“The immigration of people from an entirely different world, people with hatred in their hearts, has shattered that once great country,” Trump wrote in a post on Sunday morning.

“Close your borders and take control, before it is too late!”

The demonstrations began a month earlier with teachers and students protesting staff shortages before expanding into a broader movement driven by anger over rising prices.

They have been joined by extremist politicians and activists such as Jean-Luc Melenchon, head of the hard-Left France Unbowed party.

Scenes from the weekend showed looters in France smashing their way into designer stores to steal luxury items amid the ‘unrestrained violence’.

Dozens of hooded young men were filmed swarming high-end outlets like Christian Dior and Louis Vuitton, leaving shelves of expensive jewelry and clothing entirely bare.

In an address Sunday night, Macron blamed ‘agitators from far-Left fringe groups, joined by numerous criminals’ for plunging his country into ‘unbridled violence.’ 

He made a plea ‘for unity’ following the weekend of chaos, which saw nearly 2,400 people arrested and almost 1,000 police and gendarmes injured – seven seriously.

‘Looking at these images, we have all asked ourselves how French people could do this to France.

‘Nothing justifies it, nothing explains it, nothing excuses it.

‘Those who looted will have to pay back for the damage, and those who sought to bring down the Republic will be held accountable,’ he then vowed.