Despite mounting criticisms, President Donald Trump has refused to walk back his earlier tirade on deceased Hollywood movie director Rob Reiner hours after he was murdered in his residence alongside his wife on Sunday.
Even as condolence messages poured in for Mr Reiner, Mr Trump seized the moment to suggest the movie director died “reportedly due to the anger he caused others through his massive, unyielding, and incurable affliction with a mind crippling disease known as TRUMP DERANGEMENT SYNDROME”.
Mr Trump posted the statement on Truth Social, announcing the circumstances surrounding his death were “sad” while refusing to mourn the dead, let alone condole the bereaved.
Mr Trump was immediately pilloried by fellow Republicans and the opposition, who said his remarks were too harsh and insensitive. Jenna Ellis, Mr Trump’s former lawyer, said that as a survivor of two assassination attempts, the president should know better.
Asked whether he regretted the post, Mr Trump stood by his words, insisting that Mr Reiner was “deranged” till his passing. He asserted the Hollywood director pushed false narratives that he had links to Russia and was being controlled by Moscow.
“I wasn’t a fan of his at all. He was a deranged person, as far as Trump is concerned,” the U.S. leader told a journalist on Monday. “He knew it was false – that I was a friend of Russia, controlled by Russia. The Russia hoax – he was one of the people behind it. He hurt himself career-wise.”
Mr Trump said Mr Reiner was bad for the U.S.
“He became deranged—Trump Derangement Syndrome. I was not a fan of Rob Reiner. At all. In any way, shape, or form. I thought he was very bad for our country,” said Mr Trump.
Mr Reiner, a democrat who campaigned for LGBTQ rights, was among Mr Trump’s harshest critics. He rebuked Mr Trump in 2017 as “mentally unfit” to lead the American people. The following year, he claimed Mr Trump engaged in activities tantamount to “treason”.
Messrs Trump and Reiner nursed an open animosity for each other. Still, U.S. politicians said Mr Trump’s comments were “inappropriate”.
In response, Thomas Massie, a Republican in Kentucky, wrote that “regardless of how you felt about Rob Reiner, this is inappropriate and disrespectful discourse about a man who was just brutally murdered”.
