Liberal Forum

NOAA staff were reportedly warned against publicly contradicting Trump about his claim that Hurricane Dorian would hit Alabama.

Staff at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration received an odd, agency-wide warning from a top official just hours after President Donald Trump sparked widespread confusion by tweeting that Alabama could be hit by Hurricane Dorian, The Washington Post reported Saturday evening.

The official's September 1 directive told employees not to "provide any opinion" and to "only stick with the official National Hurricane Center forecasts if questions arise from some national level social media posts which hit the news this afternoon," according to an email obtained by The Post.

The "national level social media posts" in question were widely understood within the NOAA to refer to Trump's tweet, one meteorologist told The Post.

But before the memo was sent out to NOAA staff, the National Weather Service's Birmingham office had already refuted Trump's tweet, clarifying that Alabama would "NOT see any impacts from the hurricane."

"This is the first time I've felt pressure from above to not say what truly is the forecast," the meteorologist told The Post.

The person continued: "It's hard for me to wrap my head around.

One of the things we train on is to dispel inaccurate rumors and ultimately that is what was occurring — ultimately what the Alabama office did is provide a forecast with their tweet, that is what they get paid to do."