Donald Trump in Mother Jones magazine
On Drugs:
1990: Drug enforcement is a joke; 2015: only medical pot
The GOP front-runner's position has changed over the years. In 1990, he was quoted in the Sarasota Herald-Tribune as saying that US drug enforcement efforts were "a joke" and that drugs should be legalized to "take the profit away from these drug czars."
Fast-forward 25 years and now Trump is opposed to legalization. "I say it's bad," he told the crowd at the Conservative Political Action Conference in June, in response to a question about
Colorado's legal weed. "Medical marijuana is another thing, but I think [recreational marijuana] it's bad. And I feel strongly about that." But what about states' rights? "If they vote for it, they vote for it.
But they've got a lot of problems going on right now, in Colorado. Some big problems. But I think medical marijuana, 100 percent."
Source: Mother Jones 2015 coverage of 2016 presidential hopefuls
Oct 28, 2015
On Crime:
FactCheck: yes, second chance with criminal justice reform
Trump said, "Our roaring economy has, for the first time ever, given many former prisoners the ability to get a great job and a fresh start. This second chance at life is made possible because we passed landmark Criminal Justice Reform into law.
Everybody said that Criminal Justice Reform could not be done, but I got it done, and the people in this room got it done."Mother Jones Fact-Check: Yes, it's true that Trump signed a much-heralded bill in
2018 to reform the federal criminal justice system, with broad bipartisan support. The First Step Act made changes that have reduced the federal prison population, and it was the first criminal justice reform bill to pass Congress in a generation.
So far, the law has shortened the prison stays of about 2,500 people who were serving disproportionately long sentences for crack cocaine offenses, most of them African American. And it could lead to improvements in prison conditions.
Source: Mother Jones Fact-Check on 2019 State of the Union
Feb 4, 2020
On Drugs:
Legalize drugs and use tax revenue to fund drug education
Trump argued in 1990 that the only way to win the War on Drugs was to legalize drugs and use the tax revenue to fund drug education programs.
As he put it, "You have to take the profit away from these drug czars." In his 2000 book, The America We Deserve, he stated that he'd never tried drugs "of any kind."
Source: Tim Murphy in Mother Jones magazine
Apr 20, 2011
On Energy & Oil:
Establish panel devoted to challenging climate science
The environmental group 350 Action released a candidate scorecard known as the 2020 Climate Test to assess presidential hopefuls on three major metrics: support for a Green New Deal, opposition to new fossil fuel development and refusal to accept money
from energy companies.Trump is the only Republican listed; he failed all three tests. On the Democratic side, 2020 candidates have for the most part indicated support for environmental policies, though some appear more willing
to acknowledge the seriousness of the situation than others.
Despite public sentiment [in favor of climate action], Trump and his administration have maintained a firm anti-environment agenda.
The president regularly mocks the idea of climate change on Twitter, and the White House is planning to set up a panel devoted to challenging the science behind the phenomenon that includes an avowed climate skeptic.
Source: Mother Jones, "On Climate," on 2020 Presidential Hopefuls
Mar 27, 2019
On Energy & Oil:
Pursues "energy dominance" agenda, even during pandemic
During the partial government shutdown that started in December 2018 and became the longest in US history, the fossil fuel-friendly Trump administration plowed ahead with its "energy dominance" agenda. As about 800,000 federal workers went without
paychecks, the Interior Department worked to boost oil & gas development in the Alaskan Arctic, processed fossil fuel drilling applications & permits, and even brought back dozens of furloughed employees to ensure offshore drilling activities continued.
Amid a global pandemic Trump and his team have prioritized fossil fuel production. The Interior Department is moving forward with fossil fuel lease sales, as the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management offered up 78 million acres in the Gulf of Mexico
despite environmental groups' calls to halt the sales. A spokesman for the bureau said the event was "live-streamed with only a handful of BOEM workers," with bids submitted either by mail or at the bureau's New Orleans office.
Source: Mother Jones on Trump Administration
Mar 23, 2020
On Environment:
Won't go to circuses that cut elephants due to animal rights
Trump tweet of 3/5/15: "Ringling Brothers is phasing out their elephants. I, for one, will never go again. They probably used the animal rights stuff to reduce costs."Here is our investigation into what those poor
elephants were experiencing:
"The Cruelest Show on Earth": Bullhooks. Whippings. Electric shocks. Three-day train rides without breaks. Our yearlong investigation rips the big top off how Ringling Bros. treats its elephants.
Source: Mother Jones Fact-Checking of 2016 presidential hopefuls
Mar 6, 2015
On Free Trade:
FactCheck: No, VATs are not tariffs against US exports
Trump said, "Mexico has a VAT tax. When we sell into Mexico, there's a tax, automatic, 16 percent. When they sell into us, there's no tax." Trump has never mentioned VATs before. Yesterday an economist at UC Irvine released a report analyzing Trump's
economic plan and taking aim at VAT taxes. [But that's not how VATs work].When a company in Germany makes goods to sell at home, it has to pay the VAT. But if it makes them to sell in the US, it doesn't--the tax gets waived at the border. If a US
company sells in Germany, it does have to pay the VAT. [The UC Irvine] interpretation is that] border adjustability turns the VAT into an "implicit export subsidy" for foreign companies and an "implicit tariff" on US exporters. This is just dead wrong.
Everybody has to pay Germany's VAT when they're selling goods in Germany. Nobody has to pay Germany's VAT when they're selling goods outside of Germany.
You can't really blame Trump for this one: a guy with a PhD in economics fed this stuff to him.
Source: Mother Jones Fact-check on First 2016 Presidential Debate
Sep 27, 2016
On Principles & Values:
Paid hush money to porn star, lied about Moscow deal
Trump directed his lawyer, Michael Cohen, to make illegal hush-money payments to porn star Stormy Daniels shortly before the election to keep her from talking about her alleged extramarital affair with Trump. Trump secretly tried to score a
development project in Moscow that could have earned him hundreds of millions of dollars, and his company asked Vladimir Putin's office for assistance in sealing the deal. (Trump falsely told American voters that he had no business interests in Russia.)
Source: Mother Jones magazine on impeaching Trump
Dec 18, 2019
On Principles & Values:
The insurrection took place on November 3rd, not January 6th
The ex-president sat down at Mar-a-Lago and was asked whether he thought it was "a mistake" to have held a rally at the White House Ellipse on January 6. It was during that rally that Trump directed his supporters to march to the Capitol Building
and "show strength" against the congressional certification of Joe Biden's victory or risk losing their country forever."It was a massive rally, with hundreds of thousands of people," Trump claimed in response to the question. "I think it was the
largest crowd I've ever spoken before. And the real--I reverse it--the insurrection took place on November 3rd, that was Election Day, and before and after. That was to me, the insurrection. And January 6th was a protest."
Trump then reiterated his
claims about crowd size along with another familiar tactic meant to deceive the public about the horrific events at the Capitol: "And then, unfortunately, some bad things happened," he said, "but also, the other side had some very bad things happen."
Source: Mother Jones magazine on 2020 Election Denialism
Dec 8, 2021
Page last updated: Mar 09, 2024