January 31, 2016

Fox News Sunday host Chris Wallace asked GOP presidential frontrunner Donald Trump about his supposed new found love for veterans' groups and an article in Forbes Magazine criticizing him for the fact that over the years, he's given a lot more money to the Clinton Foundation than he has to veterans.

Trump pretty well shrugged it off and chalked it up to him being a businessman at the time rather than a politician. His followers aren't likely to care in the primary race, but I have to wonder if the hypocrisy might finally come back to bite him in a general election if he ends up winning the Republican nomination.

WALLACE: You talked earlier about the veterans event you held during the debate and that you're proud of it, and understandably so. You raised $6 million, including $1 million out of your own pocket.

But, sir, "Forbes" magazine took a look at your record of supporting veterans groups over the years and what they found is that from 2009 to 2013, the Trump Foundation donated $57,000 to groups helping veterans. But over the years, they say that you gave at least twice that, somewhere between $100,000 and $250,000 to, of all things, the Clinton Foundation.

TRUMP: Well, what I have done is I've given a lot of different events at Mar-a-Lago for the veterans. We have many. I can get you a list. I didn't know you'd be bringing this up, but I can get you a list of all of the events I've given in Palm Beach, Florida, in different hotels I have for the veterans.

And I've opened up my houses. I've opened up my -- in a couple of cases, my buildings. And we've given many events. But I can certainly get you that list and I'd be proud to.

I did give to the Clinton Foundation. What I didn't know is they'd be using it for private aircraft and things like that. The Clinton Foundation was helping with Haiti and with lots of other things and I thought it was going to do some good work. So, it didn't make any difference to me.

Again, I was a businessman and it was my obligation to get along with everybody, including the Clintons, including Democrats and liberals and Republicans and conservatives.

As a businessman, I had an obligation to do that, Chris.

I'm still waiting to see how much of that money he raised actually went to legitimate veterans' groups, and not some sham group like the last time he did this.

Discussion

We welcome relevant, respectful comments. Any comments that are sexist or in any other way deemed hateful by our staff will be deleted and constitute grounds for a ban from posting on the site. Please refer to our Terms of Service for information on our posting policy.
Mastodon