President Donald Trump shouted down two reporters who asked him about rising anti-Semitism in America and said he “hates” being called an anti-Semite, although neither reporter called him one.
Trump, fielding questions at a contentious news conference Thursday about the multiple scandals and mishaps afflicting his young administration, said he wanted to take a question from a friendly reporter.
Jake Turx, a haredi Orthodox reporter for Ami Magazine, volunteered, saying “I’m friendly,” and prefaced his question by saying his community did not regard Trump as anti-Semitic.
“I haven’t seen anyone in my community accuse you or anyone on your staff of being anti-Semitic,” Turx said. “We understand that you have Jewish grandchildren, you are their zaide.”
Trump appeared to understand what Turx was saying, thanking him.
“What we haven’t really heard being addressed is an uptick in anti-Semitism and how the government is planning to take care of it,” Turx continued, citing dozens of bomb threats called into Jewish community centers in recent weeks.
Trump interrupted and accused Turx of dishonesty.
“It’s not a simple question, not a fair question,” he said. “I am the least anti-Semitic person that you have ever seen in your entire life.” The president also said he was the “least racist person.”
Turx interrupted, saying he did not believe Trump was anti-Semitic, and Trump shouted him down, “Quiet, quiet, quiet.”
“See, he lied about, he was going to get up and ask a straight simple question, so, you know, welcome to the world of the media,” Trump said.
“I hate the charge, I find it repulsive, I hate even the question,” he said, going on to cite Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s statement a day earlier at a joint news conference that “there is no greater supporter of the Jewish people and the Jewish state than President Donald Trump.”
“You heard the prime minister, you heard Netanyahu yesterday, did you hear him? Bibi,” Trump said. “He said, ‘I’ve known Donald Trump for a long time,’ and then he said, ‘Forget it,’ so you should take that instead of having to get up and ask a very insulting question like that.”
Another reporter tried to raise a similar question, asking about “rising anti-Semitism,” some of it committed in his name.
Trump, again interrupting, replied that he thought a lot of the instances were his opponents trying to smear him by disguising themselves as his supporters.
“Some of that anger is caused by people on the other side,” he said. “It will be by people on the other side to anger people like you.”
Trump defended his record, saying the country was divided long before he took office and that it was his plan to unite it.
Turx on Twitter said he hoped the White House would understand that Trump “clearly misunderstood” his question.
“This is highly regretful and I’m going to seek clarification. #TrumpNewsConference,” he wrote.
The American Jewish Committee (AJC) and the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) later decried Trump’s brusque treatment.
“It is honestly mind-boggling why President Trump prefers to shout down a reporter or brush this off as a political distraction,” Jonathan Greenblatt, the ADL’s national director, said in a statement posted on Twitter.
The American Jewish Committee’s CEO, David Harris, also posted a statement on Twitter.
“Instead of answering a timely and legitimate question, the president chose instead to besmirch the journalist,” Harris wrote.
