Donald Trump blamed a tragic plane crash that killed 60 people in Washington DC on diversity hiring, disabled people and Joe Biden in a deeply shocking press conference. The President of the United States gave a lengthy press conference in the White House Briefing Room to give an update on the investigation. After briefly offering his sympathies to the families of those killed in the crash, and confirming there were no survivors, he pivoted to assigning blame for the tragedy.

Last night, a military Black Hawk helicopter crashed into an American Airlines jet as it was on its final approach to Washington's Ronald Reagan Airport - just a mile or so from the White House. The collision caused both aircraft to plunge into the icy Potomac River. But the President used most of the press conference to blame the accident on his political opponents, and diversity hiring programmes employed by the Federal Aviation Authority - which his White House cancelled last week.

Here are the most bizarre and inappropriate things Donald Trump said in the briefing. "We do not know what led to this crash, but we have some very strong opinions," Trump said from the podium. "And I think we'll probably state those opinions now. "Because over the years I've watched as things like this happen and people say, well, we're always investigating, and three years later they announce it.". He went on: "Well, we think we've got some pretty good ideas.".

Initially he sought to blame the disaster on his biggest political enemy - Joe Biden, who defeated him in the 2020 election. "We must have only the highest standards for those who work in our aviation system," he said. "I changed the Obama standards from mediocre at best to extraordinary. You have to be the highest intellect and psychologically superior people who are allowed to qualify for air traffic controllers.

"That was not so prior to when I arrived in 2016...and then when I left office and Biden took over he changed them back to lower than ever before. I put safety first, and Biden, Obama and the Democrats put policy first.". We've been unable to find any evidence that President Trump raised hiring standards for air traffic controllers. He did spend quite a lot of time in his first term trying to privatise air traffic control, however.

Trump went on a long tirade about diversity hiring programmes - which seek to hire qualified people from a wide range of backgrounds into organisations that had previously been heavily skewed towards white men. Last week he signed an order cancelling all Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) programmes - and putting all government officers working on them on paid leave. His argument is that it will make hiring practices "colour blind" and bring back "common sense" to hiring.

And he heavily suggested - at length, and without providing any evidence - that the crash was caused by DEI programmes hiring people to be air traffic controllers who were not qualified for the "genius" level position. "We have to have our smartest people," he said. "It doesn't matter what they look like, how they speak. What matters is intellect. Talent. The word talent. You have to be naturally talented geniuses.".

Asked by a reporter if he was really suggesting diversity programmes cause the crash, Trump replied: "They just may have.". Trump waved a paper article in the air, which claimed the Federal Aviation Authority (FAA) had been hiring people "with severe intellectual and psychiatric disabilities.". The report he was waving was produced by right wing network Fox News from earlier in January - which was pushed heavily by Elon Musk.

While it is true that the FAA ran a programme hiring people "from as many sources as possible", the policy had been in place since at least 2013, and existed through Trump's entire first tern. In a statement when the article was first published, the FAA clearly explained that all staff hired through the programme were "qualified" and worked in a variety of roles. They said: "The FAA employs tens of thousands of people for a wide range of positions, from administrative roles to oversight and execution of critical safety functions. Like many large employers, the agency proactively seeks qualified candidates from as many sources as possible, all of whom must meet rigorous qualifications that of course will vary by position.".

Trump read out a page from the FAA website, which stated the government had identified some disabilities for special focus including "hearing, vision, missing extremities, partial paralysis, complete paralysis, epilepsy, severe intellectual disabilities, psychiatric disability and dwarfism.". He said people with the above conditions "all qualify to be controllers". This is untrue. The list he read out is from a US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission report identifying underrepresented groups in the government workforce. It was cross-government and has nothing to do with air traffic control.