Donald Trump Praised Putin For Bashing The Term âAmerican Exceptionalismâ In 2013
âItâs very insulting and Putin really put it to him about that.â
Donald Trump praised Vladimir Putin in 2013 for his New York Times op-ed in which he criticized President Obama's use of the phrase "American exceptionalism."
Speaking on Piers Morgan Tonight in September 2013, Trump said Putin âreally put itâ to President Obama over the phrase.
âYou think of the term as being fine, but all of sudden you say, what if youâre in Germany or Japan or any one of 100 different countries? Youâre not going to like that term,â said Trump. âItâs very insulting and Putin really put it to him about that.â
Trump has found himself under attack from both Democrats and Republicans for praising Putin, especially after Russia's suspected involvement in the hacking of the Democratic National Committee's servers. Last week, Trump asked Russia to release Hillary Clintonâs emails, a comment he later claimed was sarcastic. On Sunday, Trump said Russia was not already in Ukraine despite the 2014 seizure of Crimea and parts of eastern Ukraine. He also attempted to explain past comments about having a relationship with Putin.
Trump defended Putin's criticism of the term "American exceptionalism" on Fox News.
âWhen he criticizes the president for using the term âAmerican exceptionalism,â if you're in Russia, you don't want to hear that America is exceptional,â Trump said on On the Record. âAnd if you're in many other countries, whether it's Germany or other places, you don't want to hear about American exceptionalism because you think you're exceptional. So I can see that being very insulting to the world.â
âAnd that's basically what Putin was saying is that, you know, you use a term like âAmerican exceptionalism,â and frankly, the way our country is being treated right now by Russia and Syria and lots of other places and with all the mistakes we've made over the years, like Iraq and so many others, it's sort of a hard term to use,â Trump added.
âOther nations and other countries don't want hear about American exceptionalism. They're insulted by it. And that's what Putin was saying.â
In June, Mother Jones posted video of Trump saying he didn't like the term American exceptionalism.
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Andrew Kaczynski is a political reporter for BuzzFeed News and is based in New York.
Contact Andrew Kaczynski at andrew.kaczynski@buzzfeed.com.
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