Donald Trump Ignites Online Firestorm With Controversial Remark on Eminent Domain: ‘Indefensible’
October 8, 2015 in Economy, News by RBN Staff
Source of much of the controversy: ‘In the 1990s, Trump wanted to acquire Vera Coking’s three-story house in Atlantic City, N.J., to build a limousine parking lot. His allies at the state’s casino reinvestment authority tried unsuccessfully to seize it.’ Mel Evans/AP
Donald Trump ruffled the feathers of many conservatives Tuesday when he said during a Fox News interview that eminent domain is a “wonderful” thing.
“What do you think of eminent domain?” host Bret Baier asked.
“Well, I think eminent domain is wonderful if you are building a highway and you need to build, as an example a highway, and you are going to be blocked by a holdout or, in some cases it’s a holdout, nobody knows this better than I do because I built a lot of buildings in Manhattan and you’ll have 12 sites and you’ll get 11 and you’ll have one holdout and you end up building around them and everything else, so I know better than anybody,” Trump said.
The billionaire continued, “I think eminent domain for massive projects, for instance you are going to create thousands of jobs and you have somebody who is in the way, and you pay that person far more — don’t forget, eminent domain, they get a lot of money. And you need a house in a certain location because you are going to build this massive development that is going to employ thousands of people … I think eminent domain is fine.”
“It’s called economic development,” the real estate tycoon added.
Backlash on Twitter among conservatives was immediate.
i mean pick one or the other pic.twitter.com/0Jd2yIwyB3
— andy levy (@andylevy) October 6, 2015
This answer on eminent domain from Trump on Fox tonight has been a big attack point from conservatives. pic.twitter.com/SCryOBaYzs — Sopan Deb (@SopanDeb) October 7, 2015
See More Tweets at: THE BLAZE
