Rick Santorum said during an appearance CNN's New Day that former President Barack Obama told bigger, more damaging lies than President Donald Trump. The claim followed host Chris Cuomo's presentation of an exhaustive list of 3,001 lies Trump reportedly told in a span of 466 days.
The list is courtesy of The Washington Post, which has been steadily counting the number of times Trump has said something provably false or misleading. When Cuomo showed Santorum graphs and data from the list, the former presidential hopeful immediately pivoted toward Obama's track record.
"I think the substance of the previous president's lies were much more important than the substance of what the crowd size was at the inaugural," Santorum said, referring to one of the first huge whoppers of the Trump administration.
He went on to note Obamacare's original promises, including that people would be able to "keep their doctor" and "keep their insurance," before Cuomo cut him off. "You're gonna put it on Obama?" the host asked incredulously, "Moral relativism from a practicing Catholic?"
Santorum didn't relent, insisting that there was a difference. The media, he said, is harsher on Trump than it ever was during Obama's tenure.
"I don't think we're putting it in the context that it needs to be put in, which is the media has focused a lot more on this president than it has President Obama," he said.
Backed into a corner, the former Pennsylvania senator did eventually admit that Trump seems to have an issue with making false claims.
"I don't think we're putting it in the context that it needs to be put in, which is the media has focused a lot more on this president than it has President Obama," he said. "I'm not saying this president is not subject to hyperbole and exaggeration and other things. He is," Santorum said.
"Does he lie?" Cuomo pressed on.
"I don't know," Santorum responded. "He certainly says things that don't comport with the facts...I don't like calling people liars, but the reality is this president has a problem," Santorum finally conceded.
Santorum faired better than GOP Representative Jim Jordan, who fumbled when asked the same question during an appearance on Anderson Cooper 360. The Ohio politician steadfastly refused to concede that he had ever heard the president lie, a withholding that earned him thousands of detractors on Twitter and Reddit.
