Leading Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump scoffed Monday at the suggestion that he check every statistic on his Twitter account after he posted an image containing made-up statistics on race and murder.
Trump told Fox News' Bill O'Reilly in an interview that he believed the image came from credible sources.
"Am I going to check every statistic?" Trump asked.
"This was a retweet," Trump added. "It came from sources that are very credible, what can I tell you."
The graphic attributed its data to an agency that doesn't exist and stated the vast majority of murders of white victims were killed by black offenders. In reality — based on the most recent set of FBI crime statistics — most white victims are killed by white offenders, and most black victims are killed by black offenders.
It wasn't immediately clear who made the graphic, but the exaggeration of black-on-white crime is a familiar tactic within white supremacy circles. Charles Johnson of Little Green Footballs reported the graphic was first tweeted from an account with a profile photo of a modified swastika used by a Nazi religious movement. The account has since been taken down.
During Monday's interview, O'Reilly questioned Trump's claim that he had heard similar statistics from credible sources, including radio shows. O'Reilly offered advice that Trump check the facts he tweets or take a break from Twitter.
"Don't do this," O'Reilly said. "Don’t put your name on stuff like this."
Trump added that he believed his supporters knew he had no racist intentions.
"I think people know better than that," he said. "I’m probably the least racist person on earth."