September 15, 2016 | No Comments
Donald Trump on Thursday vowed again to cut all ties to his businesses and, in the wake of a Newsweek report that questioned potential conflicts of interest with international dealings, pledged that his company “would absolutely get out in some form” if sanctions were imposed on countries where it conducts business.
“Well I will sever connections and I’ll have my children and my executives run the company,” Trump told “Fox & Friends” in the first segment of a two-part telephone interview. “And I won’t discuss it with them. It’s just so unimportant compared to what we’re doing about making America great again. I just wouldn’t care. I guess you can say there’s a conflict because as the company – country – gets stronger, that’s good for all companies, right? But I wouldn’t care. It’s so unimportant compared to what I’m doing right now.”
Trump reiterated that he would “absolutely sever” ties and would have “nothing to do with my company” as president. The Republican nominee has previously indicated that he would place the businesses in a blind trust run by his children and executives.
Co-host Brian Kilmeade followed up, “Knowing that you made these companies, if sanctions went on a country that would hurt your company or your hotels, would you hesitate?”
“Oh, I would absolutely get out in some form. I mean … its ownership would have to sell. I will get out of those countries. I wouldn’t be able to be involved and then nobody else is able to, but I don’t think we have too many of those companies, quite frankly,” Trump said. “It’s a very interesting question. I would get out. I would get out of those countries.”
The questions follow a Newsweek report published Wednesday detailing how the Trump Organization’s foreign business could hamper U.S. national security if Trump is elected president. Hillary Clinton and Democrats have seized upon the report, with the Democratic nominee’s Twitter account posing a list of questions raised about potential conflicts of interests mentioned in the article.
Trump himself remarked that he had heard the article “made me out to be extremely successful but very complicated company.”
“Actually, I have a very simple company,” Trump said. “I have, you know, deals all over the world and they are great deals and they are really – it’s a very simple company from that standpoint structurally and I own my own company but it made me to be – I did hear, in fact, if you read the first paragraph, it says a lot – it’s got me out to be very successful, which I am, very, very successful.”