Eric Trump Says Bragging About Sexual Assault is What Happens When You’re an ‘Alpha Personality’

During a stop at the Trump campaign’s Denver, Colorado office on Monday, Eric Trump defended his father’s “lewd” conversation with Billy Bush about sexually assaulting women.

The 32-year-old Trump not only excused his father’s conversation with the tired “locker room banter” narrative, he also suggested it’s what happens when two alpha personalities come together, while simultaneously pointing the finger at the Clintons.

Trump alleged that the Clinton campaign leaked the 2005 tape and said, “I think that’s Hillary going low. I think you’ve seen that for a long time,” the Gazette reports. He added, “She’ll dig out dirt on someone from 15 years ago when someone is in entertainment.”

Trump also said, “And, listen, my father apologized for it. He was right to apologize for it, and I’m glad he apologized for it. At the same time, if you look at her track record with women, it’s horrible. It’s absolutely horrible.”

A few things: bragging about kissing and groping women without consent is not locker room talk, it is sexual assault; it doesn’t matter when the tape was recorded, it was released on October 7, 2016 and thus should be examined in relation to the GOP nominee’s campaign; Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton’s husband is not relevant to Trump sexually assaulting women.

The young Trump shared with the office staff, “I think sometimes when guys are together they get carried away, and sometimes that’s what happens when alpha personalities are in the same presence,” on why his father and Billy Bush shared in such a “lewd” exchange about grabbing women by the “p*ssy” and getting away with it because of status.

Add “alpha personalities” to the list of excuses Trump supporters and surrogates are making for the Donald’s gross disregard for women.

According to Trump, it’s only normal for two big wigs to brag about sexual assault while on the bus together — it’s a status thing. They’re also apparently entitled to groping women because of that same alpha status.

A number of top Colorado Republicans have reportedly pulled their support for Trump over the leaked recordings.

(h/t Raw Story)

Trump Hosts Surprise Panel with Bill Clinton’s Accusers

Donald Trump, reeling after two days of Republican disavowals and disaffections over a 2005 videotape of him bragging about his ability to get away with sexual assault, attempted to change the subject to his opponent’s husband’s alleged infidelities.

Just 90 minutes before his second debate Sunday night with Hillary Clinton, the GOP nominee held a surprise panel, broadcast live to Facebook, with women who have accused Bill Clinton of sexual misconduct — in effect, dousing a campaign already on fire with buckets of fresh gasoline and bringing the worst fears of many Republicans to a stunning realization.

Seated beside four women — including Juanita Broaddrick, Paula Jones, Kathleen Willey and Kathy Shelton — Trump addressed viewers ahead of the debate, making an issue of the sexual history of Bill Clinton, who is not running for president.

“These four very courageous women have asked to be here, and it was our honor to help them,” Trump said of the women who then excused his comments caught on tape and released on Friday.

“Actions speak louder than words,” said Broaddrick. “Mr. Trump may have said some bad words, but Bill Clinton raped me and Hillary Clinton threatened me. I don’t think there’s anything worse.”

Broaddrick once signed an affadavit saying Clinton did not in fact rape her, but later recanted.

Standing in the back of the Four Seasons Hotel ballroom were Trump’s closest aides, including Breitbart publisher Steve Bannon and David Bossie, who have made a career — on the fringes of conservative politics — out of attacking the Clintons.

The surprise roundtable and the tawdriness of the subject is unprecedented in presidential politics, especially on the eve of a debate.

Trump, whose campaign has long tested a fragile Republican coalition that now is undeniably in tatters, is responding to a 48-hour period in which he saw dozens of GOP officeholders pull their endorsements after the video recording that showed him bragging to TV host Billy Bush about his ability to get away with “grab[bing women] by the pussy.”

Ever defiant amidst calls that he surrender the nomination and step aside, Trump is instead engaging in a scorched-earth assault that is only likely to further erode his diminished standing with women voters with potentially devastating consequences for the Republican Party, which is now bracing itself for more sweeping losses down the ballot.

Clinton, who has taken a few days off the campaign trail to prepare for the second debate and the very likelihood of such an attack from Trump, has said very little publicly since the lewd videotape came to light on Friday.

Her campaign, however, issued a statement roughly an hour before the debate began characterizing Trump’s publicity stunt as an act of desperation.

“We’re not surprised to see Donald Trump continue his destructive race to the bottom,” said Clinton’s communications director, Jennifer Palmieri. “Hillary Clinton understands the opportunity in this town hall is to talk to voters on stage and in the audience about the issues that matter to them, and this stunt doesn’t change that.

“If Donald Trump doesn’t see that, that’s his loss. As always, she’s prepared to handle whatever Donald Trump throws her way.”

(h/t Politico)

Reality

Donald Trump is asking you to ignore the actual recorded words he said 10 years ago, but to pay attention to the allegations of women against the spouse of his political opponent 20-30 years ago.

Media

CBS News

Trump Defends Sexual Assault as ‘Locker Room Talk’ At Debate

Donald Trump defended his lewd and sexually aggressive comments as “locker room” talk three times during Sunday’s presidential debate.

On Friday, previously unaired 2005 footage revealed the Republican presidential nominee bragging about trying to have sex with a married woman and being able to grope women.

“When you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything … Grab them by the pussy. You can do anything,” Trump had said.

Trump later issued a apology, calling the conversation “locker room banter.”

1. ‘This was locker room talk’

“I don’t think you understood what was — this was locker room talk. I’m not proud of it. I apologize to my family. I apologize to the American people. Certainly I’m not proud of it. But this is locker room talk.”

2. ‘It’s locker room talk’

“Yes, I’m very embarrassed by it. I hate it. But it’s locker room talk, and it’s one of those things. I will knock the hell out of ISIS. We’re going to defeat ISIS. ISIS happened a number of years ago in a vacuum that was left because of bad judgment. And I will tell you, I will take care of ISIS.”

3. ‘It was locker room talk’

“It was locker room talk, as I told you. That was locker room talk. I’m not proud of it. I am a person who has great respect for people, for my family, for the people of this country. And certainly, I’m not proud of it. But that was something that happened.”

(h/t CNN)

Reality

So what room do I need to be in to call Donald Trump a racist, sexist, motherfucker and be completely excused?

Donald Trump claimed he never did any of the actions described in the 2005 tape, but a New York Times piece interviewed hundreds of women who allege otherwise. Some, such as Jill Harth settled in court over her claims.

Media

MSNBC

Lewd Recording Uncovered of Trump Seducing a Married Woman

Donald Trump bragged in vulgar terms about kissing, groping and trying to have sex with women during a 2005 conversation caught on a hot microphone — saying that “when you’re a star, they let you do it” — according to a video obtained by The Washington Post.

The video captures Trump talking with Billy Bush of “Access Hollywood” on a bus with Access Hollywood written across the side. They were arriving on the set of “Days of Our Lives” to tape a segment about Trump’s upcoming cameo on the soap opera.

The tape obtained by the Post includes audio of Bush and Trump’s conversation inside the bus, as well as audio and video once they emerge from it to begin shooting the segment.

In that audio, Trump discusses a failed attempt to seduce a woman, whose full name is not given in the video.

“I moved on her and I failed. I’ll admit it,” Trump is heard saying. It was unclear when the events he was describing took place. The tape was recorded several months after he married his third wife, Melania.

“Whoa,” another voice said.

“I did try and f— her. She was married,” Trump says.

Trump continues: “And I moved on her very heavily. In fact, I took her out furniture shopping. She wanted to get some furniture. I said, ‘I’ll show you where they have some nice furniture.’”

“I moved on her like a bitch, but I couldn’t get there. And she was married,” Trump says. “Then all of a sudden I see her, she’s now got the big phony tits and everything. She’s totally changed her look.”

At that point in the audio, Trump and Bush appear to notice Arianne Zucker, the actress who is waiting to escort them into the soap opera set.

“Your girl’s hot as s—, in the purple,” says Bush, who’s now a co-host of NBC’s “Today” show.

“Whoa!” Trump says. “Whoa!”

 “I’ve gotta use some tic tacs, just in case I start kissing her,” Trump says.“You know I’m automatically attracted to beautiful — I just start kissing them. It’s like a magnet. Just kiss. I don’t even wait.”

“And when you’re a star they let you do it,” Trump says. “You can do anything.”

“Whatever you want,” says another voice, apparently Bush’s.

“Grab them by the p—y,” Trump says. “You can do anything.”

A spokeswoman for NBC Universal, which produces and distributes “Access Hollywood,” declined comment.

“This was locker room banter, a private conversation that took place many years ago. Bill Clinton has said far worse to me on the golf course – not even close,” Trump said in a statement. “I apologize if anyone was offended.”

The tape appears at a time when Trump, the Republican presidential nominee, has sought to make a campaign issue out of his opponent’s marriage. Trump has criticized former President Bill Clinton for his past infidelity, and criticized opponent Hillary Clinton as her husband’s “enabler.”

“Hillary Clinton was married to the single greatest abuser of women in the history of politics,” Trump told the New York Times in a recent interview. “Hillary was an enabler, and she attacked the women who Bill Clinton mistreated afterward. I think it’s a serious problem for them, and it’s something that I’m considering talking about more in the near future.”

Trump carried on a very public affair with Marla Maples — his eventual second wife — while still married to first wife Ivana Trump.

Trump has been criticized in this campaign for derogatory and lewd comments about women, including some made on TV and live radio. In an interview Wednesday with KSNV-TV, a Las Vegas television station, Trump said that those comments were made for entertainment.

“A lot of that was done for the purpose of entertainment. There’s nobody that has more respect for women than I do,” he told the station.

“Are you trying to tone it down now?” asked the interviewer, Jim Snyder.

“It’s not a question of trying, it’s very easy,” said Trump.

The tape obtained by The Post seems to have captured Trump in a private moment, with no audience beyond Bush and a few others on the bus. It appears to have been shot around September 16, 2005, which was the day press reports said Trump would tape his soap-opera cameo.

The video shows the bus carrying Trump and Bush turning down a street on the studio backlot. The two men cannot be seen.

“Oh, nice legs, huh?” Trump says.

“Oof, get out of the way, honey,” Bush says, apparently referencing somebody else blocking the view of Zucker.

The two men then exit the bus, and greet Zucker.

“We’re ready, let’s go,” Trump says, after the initial greetings. “Make me a soap star.”

“How about a little hug for the Donald?” Bush says. “He just got off the bus.”

“Would you like a little hug, darling?” Zucker says.

“Absolutely,” Trump says. As they embrace, and air-kiss, Trump says, “Melania said this was okay.”

The video then follows Trump, Bush and Zucker into the studio. Trump did appear on Days of Our Lives, in late October. In a tape of that cameo posted online, Zucker’s character asks Trump — playing himself — for a job at his business, and tells him suggestively, “I think you’ll find I’m a very willing employee. Working under you, I think, could be mutually beneficial.”

Trump’s character gives her the brushoff.

“That’s an interesting proposition,” Trump says onscreen. “I’ll get back to you.”

A publicist for Zucker did not immediately respond to questions on Friday afternoon.

In a 2005 interview on the TV show “Soap Talk,” posted online, host Lisa Rinna asked Zucker if Trump was cute.

“He is so cute and charming,” Zucker said. “You just don’t look above…” she said, and motioned to her hairline.

(h/t Washington Post)

Media

Giuliani: Trump ‘Better For the United States Than a Woman’

Donald Trump surrogate Rudy Giuliani on Sunday suggested that a man such as Donald Trump would be a better president “than a woman.”

“Don’t you think a man who has this kind of economic genius is a lot better for the United States than a woman, and the only thing she’s ever produced is a lot of work for the FBI checking out her emails,” the former New York City mayor said on ABC’s “This Week” with George Stephanopoulos.

Giuliani’s statements come on the heels of a week during which the Republican nominee has been criticized by Hillary Clinton’s campaign for comments he has made about women. At Monday’s debate, Clinton said Trump had insulted former Miss Universe Alicia Machado by calling her “Miss Piggy.” Trump and Giuliani both criticized Machado and tried to justify Trump’s comments about how much weight Machado had gained.

Giuliani told Stephanopoulos that Clinton was “programmed” to bring up Machado’s story.

“Then she mentioned the woman’s name, the model’s name, and then she made it appear as if [moderator] Lester Holt had brought it up. She had obviously been programmed to bring that up,” Giuliani said.

In addition, the Trump surrogate also said that if Clinton is going to attack Trump on how he “deals with women,” the GOP nominee’s campaign will discuss how the former secretary of state “deals with women.”

“We have to respond by how she deals with women, which is to take money from governments that kill women, take money from governments that stone women, take money from governments that have women who can’t drive cars,” he said. “Not just money, millions and tens of millions of dollars from countries in which women are treated like property and killed when they get raped.”

“And so now, basically, it’s ‘Don’t lecture me, Hillary, on feminism, because you’re a phony.'”The Trump and Clinton campaigns both released ads targeting women this past week.

(h/t Politico)

Reality

Giuliani also claimed this was a “jobless” recovery. This is not factual at all. Over 15.1 million jobs have been created since Obama took office in 2009.

Media

Trump Tweets Americans Should Watch Miss Amercia’s Sex Tape

Twitter

Update: In the title we referred to Alicia Machado as “Miss America,” she was Miss Universe.


Donald Trump has doubled down on his attacks on a former Miss Universe in a stream of early-morning tweets.

Trump’s verbal barbs directed at Alicia Machado, who won the Miss Universe title in 1996, started after the first presidential debate Monday when Hillary Clinton mentioned her and claimed that Trump used to call her “Miss Piggy” and “Miss Housekeeping.”

Rather than back away from the accusations, Trump has repeatedly defended his criticisms of the woman and her weight.

His latest came online this morning:

(h/t ABC News)

Reality

Researchers have looked and the so-called “sex tape” came from a reality television show called La Granja, which is nothing more than some grainy, night-vision footage of a couple of covered figures writhing in a bed, hardly qualifies as explicit. And reality television being what it is, the scene the tape depicts was quite possibly staged or fabricated.

Alicia Machado did pose topless for Playboy magazine, though.

However if Machado has a sex tape or not, this does not matter. The argument put forth at the first presidential debate was; Does Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump engage in bullying and sexism and are this qualities you would want in your President?  And by Trump attempting deflect charges of sexism and bullying by turning around and engaging in sexist attacks against a woman’s weight and acting like the textbook definition of a bully over several days does not help his defense.

Lawsuit Alleges Trump Wanted to Replace Unattractive Female Employees

Donald Trump wanted to fire female employees he considered unattractive and replace them with better-looking women at a golf resort he owned, according to court documents from a 2012 lawsuit.

As reported by the Los Angeles Times, the court documents detail a lawsuit that alleges Trump pressured employees at the Trump National Golf Club in Rancho Palos to replace those he viewed to be unattractive female employees over a number of years in the 2000s.

The report comes as Trump has faced renewed criticism that he disrespects women, a narrative fueled by his controversial remarks about a former Miss Universe that he worked with when he owned the beauty pageant. Hillary Clinton raised in Monday’s debate the fact that he called Alicia Machado “Miss Piggy” and “Miss Housekeeping” after she won his 1996 Miss Universe pageant.

Hayley Strozier, an employee at the golf club until 2008, alleged in a sworn declaration she “had witnessed Donald Trump tell managers many times while he was visiting the club that restaurant hostesses were ‘not pretty enough’ and that they should be fired and replaced with more attractive women.”

According to the LA Times report, the employees said in their lawsuit that they rotated employees schedules “so that the most attractive women were scheduled to work when Mr. Trump was scheduled to be at the club.”

The Trump Organization called the allegations “meritless.”

“We do not engage in discrimination of any kind,” said Jill Martin, vice president and assistant general counsel for The Trump Organization. “The statements made by a group of former disgruntled employees are far from an accurate portrayal of what it is like to work at Trump National Golf Club Los Angeles. Mr. Trump’s sole focus is on ensuring that the facility and operation are providing the highest level of service and an unparalleled golf experience. The only appearance Mr. Trump cares about is that of the facility and the grounds. Rather than looking to old statements from a handful of employees with an ax to grind, the media should focus on the thousands of happy employees, of all races, gender, size and shape, whose lives upon which Mr. Trump has made an incredibly positive impact.”

In the lawsuit, employees claim that Trump’s stated preferences regarding female employees caused managers to value appearance over skill when making hiring and staffing decisions. They also allege that Trump himself made inappropriate and unprofessional comments toward female employees.

The LA Times described the case as a “broad labor relations lawsuit” that is “focused on the course’s high-pressure work culture” in addition to spotlighting the revelations about Trump’s treatment of female employees.

According to the Times’ report, “the bulk of the lawsuit was settled in 2013” with a $475,000 payment to plaintiff employees without any admission of wrongdoing. Another female employee who said she was fired for complaining about the treatment of women at the golf club agreed to a separate settlement with confidential terms.

(h/t CNN)

In Post-Debate Interview, Trump Again Criticizes Pageant-Winner’s Weight

At the end of Monday night’s presidential debate, Hillary Clinton accused Donald Trump of taunting one of his former Miss Universe contestants about her weight.

Clinton said the Republican nominee’s criticisms of Alicia Machado, a Venezuelan who won the Miss Universe contest in 1996, was “one of the worst things he said” about women. “He called this woman Miss Piggy. Then he called her Miss Housekeeping because she was Latina.”

While Trump appeared to dispute Clinton’s accusation on the debate stage, he called into Fox and Friends Tuesday morning and once again called Machado fat.

“I know that person. That person was a Miss Universe person,” Trump told the Fox News morning show. “And she was the worst we ever had, the worst, the absolute worst, she was impossible,” he said. “She gained a massive amount of weight, and it was a real problem. We had a real problem. Not only that, her attitude.”

With his past statements about Machado playing into critiques Clinton wanted to make at Monday night’s high-profile debate, the Clinton campaign was quick to pounce. An hour after the debate ended, her campaign tweeted a two-minute video about Machado’s experience with Trump.

“He was very overwhelming. I was very scared of him,” she says in Spanish. “He’d yell at me all the time. He’d tell me ‘you look ugly’ or ‘you look fat.’ Sometimes he’d ‘play’ with me and say ‘Hello Miss Piggy, hello Miss Housekeeping.’ ”

The Clinton campaign’s video also includes archived footage of Trump telling reporters “she weighed 118 pounds, or 117 pounds, and she went up to 160 or 170. So this is somebody who likes to eat.”

Articles at the time confirm Trump’s comments.

  • In 1997, Donald Trump told Howard Stern that Machado was an “eating machine” who “ate a lot of everything.” “You whipped this fat slob into shape,” the radio host told Trump. “I don’t know how you did it. I see all these diet plans, everything else. God bless you.” When asked if Trump had “gotten her down to 118,” he said she is going to be there soon.
  • Around the same time, Trump told Newsweek: “We’ve tried diet, spa, a trainer, incentives. Forget it, the way she’s going, she’d eat the whole gymnasium.”
  • Machado told the Washington Post at the time she was caught by surprise about reporters being present. “I asked him to please send me to a trainer or a nutritionist or something because I needed some orientation, and he sends me to a gym in New York,” she said. “When I get there, there are 80 reporters waiting to watch me sweat. I thought that was in very bad taste.”
  • Donald Trump wrote in his 1997 book Art of the Comeback, “I could just see Alicia Machado, the current Miss Universe, sitting there plumply. God, what problems I had with this woman. First, she wins. Second, she gains 50 pounds. Third, I urge the committee not to fire her. Fourth, I go to the gym with her, in a show of support. Final act: She trashes me in The Washington Post — after I stood by her the entire time. What’s wrong with this picture? Anyway, the best part about the evening was the knowledge that next year, she would no longer be Miss Universe.”

Machado told the campaign that the experience led to long-term eating disorders. “I wouldn’t eat, and I would still see myself as fat, because a powerful man had said so.”

“He always treated me like a little thing. He always treated me like trash,” Machado said Tuesday in a conference call organized by the Clinton campaign.

She said she was caught off-guard when Clinton talked about her Monday night. “I started to cry because I never imagined that someone so important would care about my story,” she said, speaking in Spanish.

“I’m very sorry that I might be an uncomfortable person for Mr. Trump,” Machado said, “but that’s how things happen, that’s how things go.”

(h/t NPR)

Media

Links

http://www.slate.com/blogs/xx_factor/2016/05/17/when_donald_trump_humiliated_miss_universe_for_gaining_weight.html

Trump Toughens Anti-Women’s Health Stance

Donald Trump has recruited the influential anti-abortion leader Marjorie Dannenfelser to lead his campaign’s national “Pro-Life Coalition.”

Not only that, but Trump has made a new policy promise that strengthens his anti-abortion position.

In a letter to anti-abortion leaders inviting them to join his coalition, Trump commits to a new policy: “Making the Hyde Amendment permanent law to protect taxpayers from having to pay for abortions.”It’s unusual for a Republican presidential nominee to move further to the right on abortion this late in an election cycle. And the move is a direct shot at Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton, whose party wrote into its platform that it would repeal the Hyde Amendment. Until this summer, the Democratic platform did not include this plank.

A longstanding policy, the Hyde Amendment bans the use of federal funds to pay for abortions for Medicaid recipients except in cases of rape, incest or when pregnancy endangers the life of the mother.

Trump’s commitment to making Hyde permanent law is new, though his running mate, Mike Pence, brought up the policy at an evangelical conference over the weekend.

In the letter, released by Dannenfelser’s Susan B. Anthony List, Trump also endorses the anti-abortion movement’s two biggest legislative priorities: defunding Planned Parenthood and passing a national ban on abortions after 20 weeks.

The late-term abortion ban, known as the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, has long been one of Dannenfelser’s top priorities. Support for the bill has been the key litmus test for GOP candidates seeking endorsements from the Susan B. Anthony List for several election seasons.

The House approved the bill this year, though the initial vote had been abruptly cancelled after some Republicans voiced concerns about a restriction on abortion for rape victims who haven’t reported the crime to the police.

Legal experts have raised questions about whether a national 20-week ban would stand up in court, but Republicans say it is part of their long game to force the issue to reverse the landmark 1973 decision in Roe v. Wade.

Trump also committed to defunding Planned Parenthood, legalizing the actions of several GOP-led states over the last year. Most of those state actions have been blocked in courts.

Trump additionally doubled down on his promise to appoint “pro-life” justices to the Supreme Court.

“Hillary Clinton’s unwavering commitment to advancing taxpayer-funded abortion on-demand stands in stark contrast to the commitments I’ve made,” Trump writes, “to advance the rights of unborn children and their mothers when elected president.”

Leaders of the anti-abortion movement were hardly quick to embrace Trump, who told an interviewer in 1999 that he supported partial-birth abortion.

But as the prospect of Clinton — a career-long advocate for abortion rights — becoming president came into focus, many anti-abortion activists sided with Trump.
Still, Trump tested their patience when he said that women should be punished for abortions if the procedure were made illegal.
Those remarks in April, which he later walked back, ignored decades of conservative doctrine on abortion, which some leaders of the movement said proved that Trump was out-of-touch with their beliefs. He arranged meetings with anti-abortion leaders, including Dannenfelser, shortly after facing the backlash.

And selecting Pence as his running mate, a trusted ally of Dannenfelser and other leaders, helped Trump immeasurably with the anti-abortion movement.
Co-chairs of the Pro-life Coalition will be announced later this month, according to SBA List’s statement. Coalition members will be asked to write op-eds, speak on Trump’s behalf on television and at public events, and recruit volunteers.

“Not only has Mr. Trump doubled down on his three existing commitments to the pro-life movement, he has gone a step further in pledging to protect the Hyde Amendment and the conscience rights of millions of pro-life taxpayers,” Dannenfelser said.

“For a candidate to make additional commitments during a general election is almost unheard of.”

Reality

Hyde Amendment means that American women — many of them women of color — who cannot afford health insurance are effectively prevented from availing themselves of a legal medical procedure that is their right and that is fundamental to their ability to exert autonomy over their reproductive lives and thus their economic and familial futures. Yes. Hillary Clinton opposes the Hyde Amendment, because it is one of the policies that exacerbates economic and racial inequality in this country.

If Donald Trump is elected president, it will likely be with a Republican congress and Supreme Court seats to fill. He could do every single one of the things he’s promising anti-abortion activists he will do. And those things would return women, in a very real way — in a way that is already happening in state and local jurisdictions around the country — to their secondary status: unable to exert full control over their bodies; barred from making choices about whether or when to bear children based on their health, their economic, or familial status, or the condition of the fetuses they carry.

Abortions accounted for 3 percent of the nearly 10.6 million total services provided by Planned Parenthood clinics in 2013, according to its annual report.

Trump Goes After African-American Pastor Who Shut Him Down for Politicking

Donald Trump on Thursday slammed the pastor who interrupted him onstage during Wednesday remarks at a Michigan church.

In a telephone interview with “Fox and Friends,” the Republican presidential nominee accused the pastor of the church in Flint, Michigan, of planning to come onstage to cut off his remarks when he addressed her congregation on Wednesday.

“When she got up to introduce me she was so nervous, she was shaking,” Trump said. “And I said, ‘Wow this is sort of strange.’ And then she came up. So she had that in mind. There was no question about it.”

He added: “She was so nervous. She was like a nervous mess. And so I figured something was up. Really.”

Several minutes into Trump’s remarks at Bethel United Methodist Church on Wednesday, Rev. Faith Green-Timmons reminded the real-estate mogul that the event was intended to focus on the water-crisis recovery in Flint, where state cost-cutting measures resulted in lead contamination in the city’s water supply.

“Mr. Trump, I invited you here to thank us for what we’ve done for Flint, not to give a political speech,” Green-Timmons said.

“Oh, OK, OK, OK, that’s good,” Trump said. “Then I’m going to go back on to Flint.”

Trump then told Fox and Friends, “The audience was saying, ‘Let him speak, let him speak!’ ”

That isn’t true. In fact, several audience members began to heckle Trump, asking pointed questions about whether he racially discriminated against black tenants as a landlord. (Which he did several times, even after being caught and punished.)

(h/t Business Insider)

Reality

How is Trump’s much-hyped outreach to African-Americans going again?

Media

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