Trump Despises Disabled People

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But Orange Man's hatred is just more profound than other "leaders".

In 2020, a few months before the last election, former President Donald Trump’s niece, Mary Trump, published a book about her uncle and how awful and psychologically warped she found him to be. At the time, her brother, Fred C. Trump III, put out a statement slamming his sister for such treachery.

Now, he’s wielding the knife. Next week, he will publish “All in the Family: The Trumps and How We Got to Be This Way,” a tellall that puts the former president in a harsh light. The New York Times obtained a copy.

Fred and Mary Trump are the children of Fred Trump Jr., Donald’s older brother who struggled with alcoholism and died of a heart attack in 1981, when he was 42.

Fred Trump, 61, describes himself as fairly close to his uncle. He attended the 2017 inauguration (he writes that he had a better seat than John Mccain) and visited the White House several times (the book includes a picture of its author sitting behind the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office).

Once, while in the Oval Office, the elder Trump insisted that his nephew stay in the room for a phone call he was about to have with King Abdullah of Jordan. He put the call on speakerphone, so his nephew could hear the king thank Trump for killing an Islamic State leader, Abu Bakr al-baghdadi. “I killed him,” the former president boasted, according to the book. “I killed him like a dog.”

But another White House meeting left the author with a chill, and, it is implied, the reason for writing the book.

Fred Trump’s son was born with a rare medical condition that led to developmental and intellectual disabilities. His care had been paid for in part with help from the family. After Trump was elected, Fred Trump wanted to use his connection to the White House for good. With the help of Ivanka Trump, his cousin, and Ben Carson, at the time the housing and urban development secretary, he was able to convene a group of advocates for a meeting with his uncle. The president “seemed engaged, especially when several people in our group spoke about the heart-wrenching and expensive efforts they’d made to care for their profoundly disabled family members,” he writes.

After the meeting, Fred Trump claims, his uncle pulled him aside and said, “maybe those kinds of people should just die,” given “the shape they’re in, all the expenses.”

The remark wasn’t a one-off, according to Fred Trump. A couple of years later, when he called his uncle for help because the medical fund that paid for his son’s care was running out of money, Fred Trump claims his uncle said: “I don’t know. He doesn’t recognize you. Maybe you should just let him die and move down to Florida.”

Another anecdote in the book occurred decades earlier, in the 1970s, when the author claims to have heard his uncle use a racial slur after his car had been damaged.

“‘Look what the (racial slur) did,’” Fred Trump writes, quoting his uncle.

Steven Cheung, a Trump campaign spokesman, called the account “completely fabricated and total fake news of the highest order.”

weren't there nazi sympathizers in his family tree? wasn't trump was known to have praised "mein kampf" to his friends? (while denying he any such to outsiders). didn't trump say to his chief-of-staff john kelly, "...hitler did a lot of good things"? if even a fraction of that is true it would color his opinion of what he considers "unfit" people.

I remember a decade ago having this coworker awkwardly tell me at lunch that he thinks that disabled babies should be killed like the Spartans did.

Yeah I just posted that?

Did you post the article or just a link to something commenting on it?

All I saw was a link to a Guardian article, which is not the same as posting the original NYT article that the Guardian is offering commentary on in their article.

No the story.

Donald Trump told his nephew he should let his disabled son die, then “move down to Florida”, the nephew writes in a new book, calling the comment “appalling”.

“Wait!” Fred C Trump III writes. “What did he just say? That my son doesn’t recognise me? That I should just let him die?

“Did he really just say that?”

The shocking exchange is described in All in the Family: The Trumps and How We Got This Way, which will be published next week. The Guardian obtained a copy.

The book also includes a description of the former US president and current Republican nominee using the N-word, news that dropped into a presidential election in which Trump faces Kamala Harris, the first woman of colour to be vice-president.

On Wednesday morning, Time published an extract detailing Trump’s callous remark about his disabled great-nephew.

It came days after family members at the Republican national convention portrayed Trump as a “very caring and loving” grandfather and family man.

But Trump family history is complicated.

Fred C Trump III is the son of Fred Trump Jr, Donald Trump’s older brother who died aged 43 in 1981. A successful New York real estate executive in his own right, Fred Trump III is with his wife Lisa a campaigner for rights for disabled people like their son, William.

In 2020, Fred Trump III’s sister, Mary Trump, published her own tell-all memoir, Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World’s Most Dangerous Man. Fred Trump III distanced himself from that book but it included the story of how Donald Trump and his siblings effectively disinherited Fred Trump III and Mary Trump, then cut off funding for William’s care.

The case was settled in 2001. In his own book, Fred Trump III describes a call to his uncle after the White House funeral of Robert Trump, the then president’s younger brother, in 2020.

Fred Trump III says Donald Trump was then “the only one” of the older Trumps still “contributing consistently” to William’s care.

He contacted his uncle even though he “really didn’t look forward to these calls” and “in many ways … felt I was asking for money I should have originally received from my grandfather” – Fred Trump Sr, the New York construction magnate whose will prompted the family feud.

Fred Trump III says he called Donald Trump after seeing him at Briarcliff, a family golf club in Westchester county, New York. He says he described his son’s needs, increasing costs for his care, and “some blowback” from Trump’s siblings.

“Donald took a second as if he was thinking about the whole situation,” Fred Trump III writes.

“‘I don’t know,’” he finally said, letting out a sigh. ‘He doesn’t recognise you. Maybe you should just let him die and move down to Florida.’”

Fred Trump III writes: “Wait! What did he just say? That my son doesn’t recognise me? That I should just let him die? Did he really just say that? That I should let my son die … so I could move down to Florida? Really?”

Fred Trump III says he shouldn’t have been surprised, since he had recently heard his uncle say something similar in an Oval Office meeting with doctors and advocates for disabled rights.

At that meeting, also in 2020, Trump “sounded interested and even concerned”, Fred Trump III writes.

“I thought he had been touched by what the doctor and advocates in the meeting had just shared about their journey with their patients and their own family members. But I was wrong.”

“‘Those people …’ Donald said, trailing off. ‘The shape they’re in, all the expenses, maybe those kinds of people should just die.’”

On that occasion, Fred Trump III writes, he “truly did not know what to say. He was talking about expenses. We were talking about human lives … I turned and walked away.”

On the later call about William, Fred Trump III writes, his uncle said the same thing: “Only that time, it was other people’s children who should die. This time, it was my son.”

Fred Trump III says he pushed back but avoided an argument. Nonetheless, he says “Donald’s comment was appalling”, adding: “It hurt to hear him say that.”

“Acceptance and tolerance would only come with public education and awareness,” Fred Trump III writes. “Donald might never understand this.”

Tell me you didn't bother to actually read either your Guardian article or the NYT article I posted without admitting you didn't bother to read them.