--- title: Donald Trump on Ban: 'Any Negative Polls Are Fake News' description: "Sorry, people want border security and extreme vetting," President Donald Trump tweeted early Monday morning canonical: https://time.com/4660961/donald-trump-travel-ban-polls-fake-news/ author: Maya Rhodan article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-02-06T13:48:38.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-23T03:09:11.152Z article:section: Politics og:title: President Trump Slams Negative Polls as 'Fake News' og:description: "Sorry, people want border security and extreme vetting" og:url: https://time.com/4660961/donald-trump-travel-ban-polls-fake-news/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8dc68bece77f225d/6988b8e5ab6d7729c96acbeb/donald-trump-tweet.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2560 og:image:height: 1440 og:image:alt: President Trump pauses as he talks to journalists who are members of the White House travel pool on board Air Force One during flight to Palm Beach, Florida og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: President Trump Slams Negative Polls as 'Fake News' twitter:description: "Sorry, people want border security and extreme vetting" twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8dc68bece77f225d/6988b8e5ab6d7729c96acbeb/donald-trump-tweet.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # President Trump Defends Travel Ban: 'Any Negative Polls Are Fake News' > Sponsored content. 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Brief is TIME's Washington newsletter, written by senior correspondent Philip Elliott. It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, three times a week. It reaches 85,000 subscribers with a 37.0% open rate as of August 2026. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters. by [Maya Rhodan](https://time.com/author/maya-rhodan/) ## Maya Rhodan Feb 6, 2017 1:48 PM UTC  Trump pauses as he talks to journalists who are members of the White house travel pool on board Air Force One during his flight to Palm Beach, Florida while over South Carolina, on Feb. 3, 2017. Trump pauses as he talks to journalists who are members of the White house travel pool on board Air Force One during his flight to Palm Beach, Florida while over South Carolina, on Feb. 3, 2017. Carlos Barria—Reuters by [Maya Rhodan](https://time.com/author/maya-rhodan/) ## Maya Rhodan Feb 6, 2017 1:48 PM UTC [President Donald Trump](http://time.com/4660929/trump-immigration-order-ban-court/) said in an [early-morning tweet](https://twitter.com/@realDonaldTrump) that any polls that showed Americans were not in favor of his travel ban for seven majority-Muslim countries were “fake news.” “Any negative polls are fake news, just like the CNN, ABC, NBC polls in the election. Sorry, people want border security and extreme vetting,” the president tweeted. > [](https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/828574430800539648) President Trump is an [avid consumer of news](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/05/us/politics/trump-white-house-aides-strategy.html), though he often uses his powerful Twitter platform to attack the news media. The president referenced the campaign in his Monday morning tweet because polling and pundits predicted the election would be an easy victory for Trump’s opponent, Hillary Clinton. That’s clearly not what happened. Trump’s Monday tweet focuses on polling around his controversial executive order that temporarily bars refugees from resettling in the U.S. and blocks travel from seven countries, including Iraq, Iran and Syria. Recent polling on the order has shown that the majority of Americans have a negative view of the president’s ban. A poll from [CBS News](http://www.cbsnews.com/news/americans-sharply-divided-along-partisan-lines-over-travel-ban-trump-cbs-news-poll/) found that 51% of Americans disapprove of the ban, while 45% approve. The poll found opinions were split along party lines — while 85% of Republicans were in favor of the order, 85% of Democrats were against it — but 57% of all Americans believe the ban on refugees and certain travelers goes against the country’s founding principles. Another poll by [CNN/ORC](http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2017/images/02/03/rel2a.-.trump.pdf) found that 53% of Americans disapprove of the ban while 47% approve of it. A poll by [Reuters](http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-immigration-poll-exclusive-idUSKBN15F2MG) conducted last week had slightly different results. Reuters found that 49% of Americans agreed with the order and 41% disagreed with it; about a third of those surveyed said they believe the order made them safer. On Twitter, Trump is not backing down. In a follow-up tweet on Monday, Trump said the “fake news media” spreads “lies” in order to sow divisions. “I call my own shots, largely based on an accumulation of data, and everyone knows it,” Trump tweeted. “Some FAKE NEWS media, in order to marginalize, lies!” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4660961/donald-trump-travel-ban-polls-fake-news/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4660961/donald-trump-travel-ban-polls-fake-news/"},"headline":"President Trump Defends Travel Ban: 'Any Negative Polls Are Fake News'","datePublished":"2017-02-06T13:48:38.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-23T03:09:11.152Z","description":"\"Sorry, people want border security and extreme vetting,\" the president tweeted","url":"https://time.com/4660961/donald-trump-travel-ban-polls-fake-news/","keywords":["White House","twitter","Donald Trump","onetime"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8dc68bece77f225d/6988b8e5ab6d7729c96acbeb/donald-trump-tweet.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Maya Rhodan","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/maya-rhodan/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8dc68bece77f225d/6988b8e5ab6d7729c96acbeb/donald-trump-tweet.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"President Trump pauses as he talks to journalists who are members of the White House travel pool on board Air Force One during flight to Palm Beach, Florida","caption":"President Trump pauses as he talks to journalists who are members of the White House travel pool on board Air Force One during flight to Palm Beach, Florida","creditText":"Carlos Barria—Reuters","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/white-house/","name":"White House"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4660961/donald-trump-travel-ban-polls-fake-news/","name":"President Trump Defends Travel Ban: 'Any Negative Polls Are Fake News'"}}]}] ```