The 55 craziest lines from Donald Trump's CNN town hall
Whoa boy.
Donald Trump did a town hall on Wednesday night. In front of an adoring New Hampshire audience. On CNN.
It was a command performance of the sort of lying and bullying that Trump has turned into an art form since emerging on the political scene 8 years ago.
I went through the transcript of the town hall and picked out the lines you need to see. They’re below.
“I think that, when you look at that result and when you look at what happened during that election, unless you're a very stupid person, you see what happens.”
The question asked of Trump was why people should vote him back into the White House. He talked about the last election instead. And away we go!
“That was a rigged election”
[narrator voice] It wasn’t.
“If you look at True the Vote, they found millions of votes on camera, on government cameras, where they were stuffing ballot boxes.”
These are the claims at the center of the debunked movie “2000 Mules.” Quoting from an AP fact check here: “That’s based on faulty assumptions, anonymous accounts and improper analysis of cellphone location data, which is not precise enough to confirm that somebody deposited a ballot into a drop box, according to experts.”
“I think it's a very sad thing, frankly, for the world, because, if you look at what's gone to our country, our country has gone to hell. Our borders are bad. Our military has been bad.”
USA! USA!
“And I hope that it's going to be very straight-up, because, if it's going to be straight-up, we're going to win the election.”
This is the circular logic at the center of Trump’s campaign: The only “fair” election is one he wins. If he loses, the election is, definitionally, rigged.
“I guess we're going to just win. We're at a point now. We're getting so close.”
The 2024 general election is in 544 days.
“The Constitution says that we're supposed to have legal and well-maintained and well-looked-at elections. And we didn't have that.”
[narrator voice] We did.
“That was a horrible election. And unless somebody is very stupid -- and I know you very well. You're not stupid at all. But you perhaps are given an agenda, or you have an agenda”
Again, the election was “horrible” in Trump’s mind because he lost. He has no real evidence to support this claim beyond the fact that he lost.
“January 6, it was the largest crowd I have ever spoken to”
Yes, that definitely should be the takeaway from January 6. Big crowd.
“I have never spoken to a crowd as large as this.”
Yes, yes you said that already.
“They were there with love in their heart. That was an unbelievable -- and it was a beautiful day.”
Yes, you reads that right. Trump just called January 6 — in which there was a literal riot at the U.S. Capitol — a “beautiful day.”
“I made a speech. I said, walk peacefully and patriotically, many different things.”
"We fight like hell. And if you don't fight like hell, you're not going to have a country anymore.” — Donald Trump speech on January 6.
“I don't want to bore the audience, but we can go sentence after sentence after sentence of things I said and things I put out.”
"We fight like hell. And if you don't fight like hell, you're not going to have a country anymore.”
“Now I use TRUTH, TRUTH Social. I think it's far superior, OK? I hope everybody's on -- I hope everybody's on TRUTH.”
[narrator voice] They aren’t.
“I made a video right outside the Oval Office in the Rose Garden. And I'm very proud of that video. I didn't have a script. I don't need scripts, like a certain person that's in there right now.”
He did. In that video he said of the January 6 rioters: “We love you. You’re very special. You’ve seen what happens. You see the way others are treated that are so bad and so evil.”
“It was a great video. And it was a beautiful video.”
“We love you. You’re very special. You’ve seen what happens. You see the way others are treated that are so bad and so evil.”
“There's another one I post.”
Uh, same?
“And that thug that killed her, there was no reason to shoot her at blank range.”
Just to be clear about what Trump is saying here: He is calling the police officer who shot January 6 rioter Ashli Babbitt a “thug.” So, yeah.
“I don't think [Pence] was in any danger.”
Rioters were literally chanting “Hang Mike Pence!”
“I call them the human conveyer belt. I said, even if the votes you mean -- I talked to his lawyer -- even if the votes are absolutely fraudulent, he can't send -- yes, sir, he can't send them back.”
“Sir” alert!
Mike had the right to do it. They convinced him he didn't, and it was a horrible thing for our country.
[narrator voice] He didn’t.
“And if you look in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, they had so many legal -- illegal votes, they didn't even know what to do with them.”
“Judge: Wisconsin probe found ‘absolutely no’ election fraud”
“I am inclined to pardon many of them. I can't say for every single one because a couple of them, probably, they got out of control.”
Trump is talking about the January 6 rioters here. Reminder: More than 1,000 people have been charged for their roles in the riot. So, yeah, a “couple” of them got out of control.
“They're living in hell, and they're policemen, and they're firemen, and they're soldiers, and they're carpenters and electricians and they're great people. Many of them are just great people”
Yes, he is talking about the people who attacked the U.S. Capitol. Just in case you were wondering.
“This woman, I don't know her. I never met her. I have no idea who she is. I had a picture taken years ago with her and her husband, nice guy, John Johnson”
So, Trump doesn’t know E. Jean Carroll but remembers her husband’s full name? Hmmmm….
“Her dog or her cat was named ‘vagina,’ the judge wouldn't allow to put that in.”
“This is rigged deal. This was a -- my lawyer said, sir, you don't have to do it.”
“Sir”!!! (Trump is arguing here that his lawyers said he didn’t have to testify in the E. Jean Carroll trial.)
“I have no idea who the hell -- she's a whack job.”
The audience laughed at this. About a woman who a jury just found had been sexually assaulted by Donald Trump.
“I said if you're a star, you are -- and I said women let you. I didn't say you grab. I said women let. You know you didn't use that word, but if you look, women let you.”
Ok, when you are a star women let you grab them by the privates but you don’t always do so? Is that the distinction Trump is trying to make here? Also, read this for more on his deposition on his “Access Hollywood” comments.
“People that are rich, people that are powerful, they tend to do pretty well in a lot of different ways, okay?”
Um, ok.
“A rich and famous person has no advantage over anyone else. Well, you do have an advantage, and I say unfortunately, but that's the way it is.”
But wait. You just said…oh never mind.
“We created the greatest economy in history.”
[narrator voice] He did not.
“I got you the biggest tax cuts in the history of our country, bigger than the Reagan cuts, bigger than any.”
[narrator voice] He did not.
“They made energy so high, and energy is all invasive.”
“Invasive Energy” was the name of my high school scream-core band.
“If you made do -- if you made donuts, if you made -- no matter what you did, and we had inflation the likes of which -- I guess we have, as you said, for 52 years, but I think more than that, we had no inflation, we had the lowest energy prices we've had in decades.”
“I say to the Republicans out there -- congressmen, senators -- if they don't give you massive cuts, you're going to have to do a default.”
This is actual news! Trump is saying Republicans shouldn’t compromise with President Biden on the debt ceiling — even if it means we default.
“Our country is dying. Our country is being destroyed by stupid people, by very stupid people.”
The crowd laughed. Not kidding.
“It's psychological. It's really psychological more than anything else. And it could be very bad. It could be, maybe, nothing”
Trump really covering his bases here on what the impact of default could be. Might be a catastrophic disaster for our country. Or nothing at all! Also, the debt ceiling/default is not, um, “psychological.”
“You're going to default eventually, anyway, but it's going to be much messier. I don't think you'll have to default.”
Wait, so we are definitely going to default? Or we aren’t?
“Many of these teachers are soldiers, ex-soldiers, ex-policemen.”
They are????
“And remember, we have 700 million guns -- 700 million.”
[narrator voice] We do not.
“I mean, if they don't have a gun -- it gives them security. Now, you need them for entertainment; you need them for hunting; you need them for a lot of different things.”
Ah yes, the age-old “entertainment” gun.
“I was able to do it, and I was very honored to do it.”
ICYMI: Trump is claiming credit here for getting rid of Roe v Wade. Personally.
“I think it -- I think it's frankly important to do that, but a lot of people are, you know, against that -- a relatively small -- relatively small number, but the way I -- the way I look at it.”
“I want to do what's right. And we're looking. And we want to do what's right for everybody.”
This is Trump not answering whether, as president, he would sign a federal abortion ban.
“But the fact that I was able to terminate Roe v. Wade, after 50 years of trying -- they worked for 50 years. I've never seen anything like it. They worked -- and I was even -- I was so honored to have done it.”
“I.”
“He's got an idea. And a lot of other people have an idea.”
So, so true. So many ideas. (The “he” here is Lindsey Graham — and his 15-week abortion ban proposal.)
“I did finish the wall. I built a wall.”
[narrator voice] He didn’t.
“If I'm president, I will have that war settled in one day, 24 hours.”
So, if elected, Trump will end the war in Ukraine in one day. Put a pin in that promise!
“I don't think in terms of winning and losing.”
“I want everybody to stop dying.”
Same.
“I took the documents. I'm allowed to.”
[narrator voice] He is not.
“Not really.”
Trump was asked whether he had ever showed classified documents he took from the White House to other people. Not exactly a confidence-inspiring answer!
“I said, you owe me votes because the election was rigged. That election was rigged.”
“Owe.”
“If I think it's an honest election, I would be honored to. And, right now, we are so far ahead of both Democrat and Republican. And you know what? If I don't win, this country is going to be in big trouble.”
In which the former president of the United States refuses to say whether he will accept the results of the 2024 election — and then threatens that the country is going to be in “big trouble” if he doesn’t win. Yeah, this feels like a good place to end.
CNN just hosted a Trump rally. They took his BS out of the dark on Truth Social and fed it to the general public as being relevant. They normalized his BS. Almost every headline I read today is about what a disaster the town hall was except on CNN. They are now just like Fox news. Tomorrow the CNN headline will no doubt be about un-sexy green M&Ms
I believe he would end the war in one day. He'll call in airstrikes on Ukraine and hand it to Putin on a silver platter.