Donald Trump is pinning the blame for a wave of sexual misconduct allegations against him on Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim.
“The corrupt media is doing everything in their power to stop our movement,” Trump said Friday at a campaign rally in Greensboro, North Carolina, before singling out “the failing New York Times.”
“The largest shareholder in the Times is Carlos Slim. Now Carlos Slim comes from Mexico,” he said. “He’s given many millions of dollars to the Clintons and their initiative. So Carlos Slim, the largest owner of the paper, from Mexico.”
Trump also claimed, without substantiation, that the Times newsroom is part of the Slim-Clinton alliance out to get him.
“Reporters of the New York Times, they’re not journalists, they’re corporate lobbyist for Carlos Slim and for Hillary Clinton,” he said.
“We are going to let foreign corporations and their CEOs decide the outcomes of the—“ Trump paused. “You just cannot do this. We cannot let this happen. We are not going to let it happen where they decide the outcome of our elections. They cannot do it and we are not going to let it happen.”
Trump’s language echoed a rally he held in West Palm Beach, Florida, on Thursday, where he said, “It is a global power structure that is responsible for the economic decisions that have robbed our working class, stripped our country of its wealth and put the money in the pockets of a handful of large corporations and political entities.”
Trump said Thursday “the Clinton machine is at the center of this power structure.”
The Wall Street Journal reported Friday morning that Trump would attempt to pin the recent flood of sexual misconduct allegations against him on Slim. The Slim family held about 17 percent of the New York Times Class A shares as of March, according to the Wall Street Journal. Class A shareholders collectively pick four of the Times’ 13 directors. The Sulzberger family trust controls the bulk of Class B shares, whose holders select the other nine board members. Arthur O. Sulzberger Jr. is the current publisher and chairman of the Times.
A spokesman for Slim told the Journal such charges are “totally false”: “We aren’t even active in Mexican politics.”
Sulzberger said Slim “has never sought to influence what we report.”
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