(CNN)When Otto Warmbier was returned to the United States in 2017 and died shortly afterward, President Donald Trump condemned the North Korean regime for the imprisonment and suspected torture of the college student who was arrested in 2015 for alleged spying.

"You are powerful witnesses to a menace that threatens our world, and your strength inspires us all," Trump said, addressing Warmbier's parents, during his 2018 State of the Union address. "Tonight, we pledge to honor Otto's memory with American resolve." He added in that same speech: "We need only look at the depraved character of the North Korean regime to understand the nature of the nuclear threat it could pose to America and our allies."

Fast forward to Thursday in Hanoi, when, at a summit with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un, Trump said this of Warmbier and North Korea: "He tells me that he didn't know about it and I will take him at his word." Trump added that Kim "felt badly about it. He felt very badly."

Trump is, apparently, taking the word of a brutal dictator who had his half-brother murdered with nerve gas at an airport and who continues to live a posh lifestyle while his country suffers the effects of staggering economic sanctions? The guy who North Korean media says began driving a car at age 3, helped cure Ebola and can control the weather? We're going to believe THAT guy???