PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel explained his support for Donald Trump during a speech at The National Press Club on Monday, saying that he believes the media takes Trump “too literally.”
Speaking in Washington, D.C., Thiel, the billionaire who infamously funded the defamation lawsuit Hulk Hogan, whose real name is Terry Bollea, brought against Gawker Media, explained why he supports Trump and his views on the economy.
The tech billionaire reaffirmed his support for Trump, who he called the only outsider left in the race, despite denouncing Trump’s past comments about women as unacceptable.
“This election year, both major candidates are imperfect people to say the least,” Thiel said. “I don’t agree with everything Donald Trump has said and done, and I don’t think the millions of other people voting for him do either. Nobody thinks his comments about women were acceptable. I agree, they were clearly offensive and inappropriate. But I don’t think the voters pull the lever to endorse a candidate’s flaws. It is not a lack of judgment that leads Americans to vote for Trump, we are voting for Trump because we judge the leadership of our country to have failed. This judgment has been hard to accept for some of the country’s most fortunate, socially prominent people.”
When asked if he agrees with Trump’s comments about Muslims and immigrants, Thiel went on to say that the media is always taking Trump “too literally” and that his supporters don’t actually think the GOP nominee will build a physical border wall.
“I think one thing that should be distinguished here is the media is always taking Trump literally. They don’t take him seriously, but they take him literally,” Thiel said.
“I think a lot of voters take Trump seriously but not literally,” he continued. “So when they hear things like the Muslim comment or the wall comment or things like that, the question is not are you going to build a wall like the Great Wall of China or how exactly are you going to force these tests, what they hear is we’re going to have a saner, more sensible immigration policy?”
Watch Thiel’s comments below:
