UNITED STATES (The Washington Post) – U.S. President Donald Trump called Latinos and African Americans “stupid,” among other racist comments, according to the memoir of Michael Cohen, a former personal lawyer of the Republican president.
In the book Disloyal: A Memoir obtained by The Washington Post before the publication date, Trump adds new attacks to the Latino community.
Cohen, convicted of fraud, among other crimes, claims that Trump’s three oldest children came to his office after the businessman announced his intention to run for the Republican nomination in the summer of 2015.
On that occasion, Trump said that Mexico was sending drug traffickers, criminals, and rapists to the U.S., which is why he wanted to build a wall on the border with the southern country.
Trump’s sons wanted their father to withdraw from the campaign because they were concerned that the rhetoric was “killing the company”. However, the tycoon’s lawyer said that Trump wasn’t worried about that because his business wouldn’t be affected, nor would his campaign.
“Besides, I’ll never get the Hispanic vote,” the Republican said, according to Cohen’s book. “Like black people, they are too stupid to vote for Trump. They are not my people”.
Cohen was sentenced to three years for violating Trump’s campaign finance laws by paying money to women who claimed to have had relationships with the president to buy his silence and tax evasion and false statements to a bank.
Before going to prison, the lawyer testified before Congress. He recounted numerous lies and crimes he allegedly committed to protecting Trump “a racist, a con man, and a fraud”.
The book also reflects several attacks by Trump on African Americans and his predecessor, Barack Obama. “Tell me a country run by a black person that’s not an idiot,” the president said at the time, according to Cohen.
In the book, the lawyer also explains that Trump has admiration for Russian President Vladimir Putin for his ability to “take over an entire nation and run it as if it were his enterprise, as the Trump Organization”.
In Cohen’s opinion, Putin and Trump had in common the desire to “harm (former Secretary of State and then-Democratic candidate, Hillary Clinton) in any way possible” and that there was no collusion with the Russian government for him to win the election but rather a “confluence of shared interests”.
