Donald Trump posts confusing tweet about Congressman Lou Barletta and his family, deletes it [updated]

| 10:35 pm EDT October 22, 2018
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This evening Donald Trump posted this tweet about a Republican Congressman in Pennsylvania: “We send our deepest condolences to Lou and the entire Barletta family – he has been working so hard despite this terrible situation for the people of Pennsylvania. Our thoughts and prayers are with you Lou!” The trouble was that no one could figure out what the hell Trump was talking about.

Trump’s tweet set off immediate concern that perhaps a member of Lou Barletta’s family had passed away. But there was nothing about such an incident on the newswires, raising questions about whether Trump had perhaps outed a private matter that wasn’t yet public, or had made up something that didn’t exist. Even a number of political journalists began tweeting in response that they couldn’t figure out what Trump was talking about.

This initially appeared to be about Congressman Lou Barletta’s grandson. Barletta is currently running for U.S. Senate in Pennsylvania against Democratic incumbent Bob Casey. Barletta’s grandson is currently fighting cancer. Casey pointed out that if Barletta and the GOP had succeeded in their attempts at gutting healthcare, other young kids with diseases like cancer would not have been able to get access to healthcare. Barletta took exception to the comparison. This back and forth has been going on for more than a week. But then Trump went and deleted the whole thing and tried again.

After deleting the confusing tweet, Donald Trump then posted a tweet clarifying that Lou Barletta’s brother had died. Barletta then confirmed this sad news in a tweet of his own, but he responded to the tweet that Trump had just deleted. In any case, our condolences to the Barletta family. For those interested in the Pennsylvania Senate race, FiveThirtyEight says that Bob Casey is ahead by fifteen points and has a 98% chance of winning. – this article has been updated with Trump’s replacement tweet and Barletta’s tweet.