Today Donald Trump tried to justify his relative recent business dealings with Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi. Yesterday Donald Trump boasted about how he "screwed" Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi in some business dealings. Critics questioned whether Trump should be profiting at all off of a known supporter of terrorism who has since become infamous for his brutal rule over his own people. In the video to the left, Trump continues to claim that he took advantage of Gaddafi by getting more money for a piece of land than he otherwise would have made in a year. The CNN interviewer then asks if he gave Gaddafi's money to charity. Trump goes on to claim that he did, in fact, donate the money he made off of Gaddafi to charity.
Timothy Christopher of Mediate almost immediately began to question Trump's side of the story. Christopher points out that it was not Trump who made it impossible for Gaddafi to rent the property, but instead it was local government officials. Trump had planned to rent a piece of land in Westchester to Gaddafi for one day so that Gaddafi could set up a tent outside of the United Nations building. Local New Yorkers expressed outrage because of Gaddafi's links to terrorism in the past (Gaddafi's Libyan government admitted they took part in the Lockerbie bombing of 1988 which killed 189 Americans). At that point Trump claimed that he did not know it was Gaddafi who was renting the property. At the time, Trump claimed he thought the property was being leased to the United Arab Emirates, with no connection to Gaddafi. Christopher argues that it would have been hard for Trump to have purposefully "screwed" Gaddafi when he did not even known it was Gaddafi renting the property.
Later it was the local government, not Trump, who ordered Trump to evict Gaddafi from the grounds. It was only then that the business deal fell apart.
Finally, Christopher also states that it is impossible to known whether Trump really did donate the money he made off the Gaddafi business dealings. In the past Trump has boasted about making money off the deal, but now he claims that he gave all the money away.
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