It’s often difficult to keep up with all of the offensive, weird things Donald Trump says, but America’s most fascinatingly coiffed presidential candidate — who is now being challenged by Ben Carson in the polls — seems to have been working overtime over the past few days.
At a Saturday rally in Florida, Trump attacked Carson’s religion (which, if you’re not familiar, is Seventh-day Adventist). “I’m Presbyterian,” Trump declared. “Boy, that’s down the middle of the road, folks, in all fairness. I mean, Seventh-day Adventist, I don’t know about. I just don’t know about.” (To be fair, Carson recently suggested that Trump was insufficiently fearful of God. And both men have repeatedly insulted Muslims, making it difficult to get too outraged on either of their behalves.) When asked to clarify his remarks about Carson’s faith, Trump said, “I would certainly give an apology if I said something bad about it. But I didn’t. All I said was I don’t know about it.”
On Monday, Trump held an event in Atkinson, New Hampshire, where he told the crowd that the members of the media covering his campaign are “scum.” “They’re horrible people. They are so illegitimate. They are just terrible people,” he continued. “Some of the people in the press are honorable. But you’ve got 50 percent who are terrible people.” Fair.
Also on Monday, Trump told Matt Lauer some of the struggles he faced as the son of a wealthy New York real-estate developer:
“It has not been easy for me. It has not been easy for me. I started off in Brooklyn. My father gave me a small loan of a million dollars,” Trump remarked. “I came into Manhattan, and I had to pay him back, and I had to pay him back with interest. But I came into Manhattan and I started buying properties, and I did great.”
Lauer pointed out that most people would not consider a million-dollar loan “small.” “You’re right,” Trump responded. “But a million dollars isn’t very much compared to what I’ve built,” which has been very, very yuge.
