CBS News
By Reena Flores
July 4, 2015
On
the heels of several major corporations distancing themselves from
Donald Trump's various business interests, the Republican presidential
candidate admitted Saturday
that he didn't think the corporate backlash to his inflammatory
comments about Mexican immigrants would be "quite this severe."
"I
knew it was going to be bad because I was told this. All my life I have
been told this: If you are successful, you don't run for office," Trump
said in an interview
on Fox News, addressing the recent spate of businesses that have
severed their relationships with his brand. "I didn't know it was going
to be quite this severe, but I really knew it was going to be bad."
During
his presidential campaign announcement last month, Trump emphasized the
need to curtail immigration from the southern border and criticized
Mexican immigrants for
"bringing crime" and being "rapists."
"When
Mexico sends its people, they're not sending their best," the
Republican presidential candidate said in June. "They're sending people
that have lots of problems
... they're bringing drugs, they're bringing crime. They're rapists.
And some, I assume, are good people."
Trump's
comments have since led a spate of corporations -- including Macy's,
NBC Universal, Univision and mattress company Serta -- to disavow their
partnerships with
the business mogul.
The
Republican presidential candidate has since defied those companies --
even suing Univision for $500 million because of their dropped pageant
contract -- and defended
his statements on immigration.
"It
seems like I'm sort of the whipping post because I bring it up. And I
don't understand whether you are liberal or whether you are conservative
or whether you are Republican,
Democrat -- why wouldn't you talk about a problem?" Trump said
Saturday. "The crime is raging. It's violent, and people don't want to
even talk about it. If you talk about it, you are a racist. I don't
understand it."
Some
Republicans vying for the White House, like former New York Gov. George
Pataki, rallied against Trump because of his comments about the Latino
population -- a growing
voter bloc with increasing political clout. Florida Sen. Marco Rubio,
himself the son of Cuban immigrants, also criticized the business man
and reality television star for statements that were "not just offensive
and inaccurate, but also divisive."
But Trump had a few scathing words for his rivals in the crowded 2016 Republican field.
"I
know Pataki well, and, you know, he's a sad figure. He's got zero in
the polls, and he was a terrible governor of New York. Terrible," Trump
said. "If he would have
run again, he would have failed."
"And,
you know, as far as Rubio," he continued, "he is very weak on
immigration, and I have been saying that for a long time about him."
The
GOP's current establishment front-runner, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush,
has also weighed in on what he called Trump's "extraordinarily ugly
types of comments."
"He's
not a stupid guy, so I don't assume that he thinks every Mexican
crossing the border is a rapist," Bush told reporters Saturday in New
Hampshire. "So he's doing
this to inflame and to incite and to draw attention to his campaign,
which seems to be his organizing principle of his campaign, and it
doesn't represent the Republican Party or its values."
Trump's
beliefs, according to Bush, are "wrong" and "way out of the mainstream
of what Republicans think." And when asked if the comments struck a
personal chord with
Bush and his wife, who is Mexican, the Florida Republican said, "Of
course it does, absolutely."
"Politically,
we're going to win when we're hopeful and optimistic and big and broad
rather than just 'grrrrrrr,' just angry all the time," Bush continued.
"This is an
exaggerated form of that, and there is no tolerance for it."
These
political reprimands might seem par for the course to Trump, but
criticism from his business partners seems more unexpected. On Fox News,
Trump also said that he
was "very surprised" at NASCAR, which recently said it would move a
series of banquets and conferences -- previously scheduled to be held at
the Trump National Doral Miami resort -- to a different location.
"Because
I have so many fans at NASCAR. I love the NASCAR people. I'm really
surprised with NASCAR to be honest with you," Trump said. "You know, I
have properties in
the best locations. The property you are talking about in the case of
NASCAR is Trump National Doral, which is probably one of the top resorts
in the world. If they don't go, somebody else does, so, you know, it's
not a big deal."
All in all, Trump said, his presidential run so far has been "bad for my brand."
"For
the people who say I'm doing it for my brand - this isn't good for my
brand. I think it's bad for my brand," he said. "You know, maybe I'm
leading in polls, but this
is certainly not good. I lose customers, I lose people.
"I
had one of the top shows on television, 'The Apprentice,' and I decided
not to do it because I wanted to do this. I give up hundreds of
millions of dollars of deals
where I'm doing this. Then you hear about NASCAR, and you hear about
NBC, and you hear about, you know, different people that drop Trump
because Trump wants safety in the United States. If you think of it,
what am I doing? I say let's make our country safe,
and people are offended. It's incredible to me."
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