Donald Trump believes the FAA ground stop does not look like a cyber attack or an AI problem, according to Fox News senior White House correspondent Peter Doocy, who said he had spoken to Trump by phone. These are the first reported remarks from Trump on the ground stop itself.
"He says it does not seem like this is a cyberattack or AI or anything like that," Doocy said on air on Friday.
Doocy said Trump noted that nobody had claimed credit:
"He said there's nobody taking credit, which would be common if somebody did execute a huge cyberattack like this on critical infrastructure"
Fox reports that Trump blamed "a bunch of old broken stuff" that the FAA relies on. That wording is Fox's paraphrase, not a direct quote from Trump.
HuffPost reports Doocy said Trump assured him he would tell Fox News if evidence of a cyber attack emerged.
The remarks are relayed by Doocy and are not a direct statement from Trump. HuffPost says that as of 6pm ET Trump had not addressed the ground stop publicly, and that his only public output at that point was a 5.52pm ET Truth Social post on film legislation.
Trump's reported view of the cause has not been independently checked.