Government Photographer Edited Inauguration Pics to Make Crowd Look Bigger: Documents

A U.S. government photographer edited the official pictures of Donald Trump’s January 2017 inauguration to make the crowd appear bigger, following a personal intervention from the president, according to newly released Interior Department documents. The detail was revealed in inspector general reports released to The Guardian following a Freedom of Information request. The photographer “said he edited the inauguration photographs to make them look more symmetrical by cropping out the sky and cropping out the bottom where the crowd ended,” the investigators reported, adding: “He said he did so to show that there had been more of a crowd.” The photographer said he believed the cropping was what an unidentified official “had wanted him to do,” but that the official “had not specifically asked him to crop the photographs to show more of a crowd.” The Guardian reports the documents indicate former press secretary Sean Spicer called National Park Service officials on several occasions the day after the inauguration about getting “more flattering photographs.” Spicer infamously told reporters that day that “This was the largest audience to ever witness an inauguration—period.”