After Donald Trump on Monday called for the “corrupt” Clinton Foundation to shutter immediately, Hillary Clinton’s campaign fired back that it’s Trump’s turn to “stop hiding behind fake excuses” and “come clean with voters” on his finances.
“The Foundation has already laid out the unprecedented steps the charity will take if Hillary Clinton becomes president,” campaign chairman John Podesta said in a statement. “Donald Trump needs to come clean with voters about his complex network of for-profit businesses that are hundreds of millions of dollars in debt to big banks, including the state-owned Bank of China, and other business groups with ties to the Kremlin.”
Podesta continued: “Donald Trump should stop hiding behind fake excuses and release his tax returns and immediately disclose the full extent of his business interests. He must commit to fully divesting himself from all of his business conflicts to ensure that he is not letting his own financial interests affect decisions made by his potential administration.”
Trump called the Clinton Foundation “the most corrupt enterprise in political history” in a statement on Monday, after Bill Clinton said the foundation would stop accepting foreign and corporate donations and that he would step down from his role there if his wife is elected.
BuzzFeed reported the Clinton Foundation has spent months drafting plans for the sprawling foundation to pull back and consolidate nearly all of its ongoing initiatives around the globe, dramatically downsizing the foundation in an effort to avoid conflicts of interest if Hillary Clinton is elected.
There is also a “Trump foundation”. How does it get its money? From whom, for what? How does it spend its money? On whom, for what?
It’s important to always note, when the Clinton campaign comments about the Clinton Foundation, that the work of the Foundation benefits the underprivileged and underrepresented among us, while Donald Trump’s far-flung undisclosed business interests benefit only Donald Trump.
The implicit false equivalence that the Foundation is somehow just like what Trump does needs to be vigorously debunked at every turn.
As if his tax returns would be truthful …
This is starting to look a lot like swiftboating to me.
Clinton Foundation was a charitable enterprise that functioned as a conduit between donors and recipients for things like disease prevention in Africa. It collected money and disbursed money, saving many lives.
Of course, the Trump Foundation is yet another scam run by the Donald for the purpose of collecting other people’s money to pay for his trinkets.
Republicans learned from Atwater and Rove that when their opponent has an issue advantage, the best strategy is to run straight at the issue to discredit.
But, but, fake excuses are all he’s got!