President Donald Trump responded to remarks made by former President Jimmy Carter.
Carter had defended Trump on a number of points in an interview with The New York Times published on Oct. 21.
“Just read the nice remarks by President Jimmy Carter about me and how badly I am treated by the press (Fake News),” Trump wrote on Twitter on Oct. 28.
“Thank you Mr. President!”
Just read the nice remarks by President Jimmy Carter about me and how badly I am treated by the press (Fake News). Thank you Mr. President!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 28, 2017
In the interview, Carter criticized the media coverage of Trump, saying that media organizations feel free to write whatever they want “without hesitation.”
“I think the media have been harder on Trump than any other president certainly that I’ve known about,” Carter said.
“I think they feel free to claim that Trump is mentally deranged and everything else without hesitation.”
Carter is not alone in that observation. A POLITICO/Morning Consult Poll published on Oct. 18 found that 46 percent of American voters believe that the media fabricates stories about Trump and his administration.
Carter also talked about the difficult foreign policy issues Trump faces, saying that those issues had started well before Trump came to office.
In an unusual step, Carter—a Democrat—criticized former President Barack Obama for his foreign policy.
Carter said that Obama had “refused” to talk to North Korea. In the interview, Carter also lamented the fact that Obama had the United States join the bombing of Yemen.
The criticism echoes that of Trump himself, who has said that previous administrations should have dealt with the North Korean problem.
Now, North Korea is just months away from finalizing its ability to deliver a nuclear weapon on a ballistic missile, CIA head Mike Pompeo said on Oct. 19.
Trump has said that the only solution to the North Korean crisis is a denuclearized North. The Trump administration is currently using diplomatic, economic, and military pressure in an attempt to get Pyongyang to agree.
Trump will visit South Korea during an Asia trip next month.
Carter also said that efforts by Trump’s son-in-law and Senior White House Adviser Jared Kushner have a chance to succeed.
“I’ve seen in the Arab world, including the Palestinian world … the high esteem that they pay to a member of one’s own family,” Carter said.
Carter dismissed the conspiracy theory that Trump colluded with Russia to win the elections.
“I don’t think there’s any evidence that what the Russians did changed enough votes, or any votes,” Carter said.
Carter also took a thinly veiled swipe at Obama and Clinton for using their positions in power to gain wealth.
“I don’t care if he gets rich or Clinton gets rich or whatever,” he said.
“I don’t want to get into a bragging position; I’m not trying to do that. But I announced when I was defeated I was not going to be on corporate boards, I was not going to try to enrich myself with speeches. I was patterning my policy after Harry Truman.”
Carter also said that he and his wife used their own money to establish the Carter Center.
“Rosie and I put money in the Carter Center. We never take any out,” he said.
The Clintons came into the news earlier this week when The Hill reported that they were part of a Russian bribery campaign to gain a nuclear deal under the Obama administration.
The article published on Oct. 17, said that Russia engaged in “bribery, kickbacks, extortion and money laundering designed to grow Vladimir Putin’s atomic energy business inside the United States.”
Russian investors with an interest in the deal made millions in payments to the Clinton Foundation while Hillary Clinton was involved in the decision making process on the deal as Secretary of State. A Russian investment bank with ties to the Kremlin also paid Bill Clinton $500,000 in a speaking fee around the time that the decision was made on the deal.
The deal gives Russia control over 20 percent of mineable uranium deposits in the United States.
The Hill article also revealed that the FBI was aware of the Russian bribery campaign, but did not take action. Instead, then FBI director Robert Mueller himself flew to Moscow in 2009 to provide Russia with a sample of 10 grams of highly enriched uranium (HEU).
There are now calls on Mueller to resign as the special counsel investigating the alleged collusion between Trump and Russia given his own connections to Russia.
From The Epoch Times
