Businessman Donald Trump and his daughter, Ivanka, are slamming “the media” for taking recent comments he made about Mexicans and other immigrants out of context.
As he enters his second week as an official presidential candidate Trump has faced criticism, and protestors at campaign events, after calling for a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border to keep out Mexican “rapists” and criminals.
Stumping for her dad in Manchester, New Hampshire, on Wednesday, Ivanka Trump said the media “twisted” his words.
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“He was talking about illegal immigration, and a porous border between the U.S. and Mexico; he wasn’t talking about the Mexican people,” she said when asked about the topic. “He was talking about people coming across the border illegally and so it was very sad for me to see that that message was totally taken out of context and the mainstream media really ran with it.”
Trump himself said his comments were meant to criticize U.S. immigration policies and not the Mexican people or government in a statement he released on Wednesday.
“I am personally offended by the mainstream media’s attempt to distort my comments regarding Mexico and its great people,” he said. “I have many successful business relationships with Mexican companies and employ, and am close friends with, many Mexican people. I also have tremendous respect for the leaders of Mexico, who, frankly, are much smarter and tougher than our politicians here in the United States.”
Both Democrat and Republican candidates are looking to mobilize Latino voters in 2016. When asked how he would do with that ever-growing voting bloc, Trump told reporters on Tuesday he is not worried about alienating voters with his comments.
“I do great with Latino voters. I employee so many Latinos, I have so many people working for me,” Trump said. “The Latinos love Trump, and I Iove them.”