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UPDATE 12:01 a.m. ET: As it turns out, the man the president jeered at was one of his own supporters — a former law enforcement officer named Frank Dawson, who wearing a “Trump 2020” shirt, according to Fox News.
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Dawson said he was mistaken for a protester because he was arguing with those who were later escorted out and that “everything’s good.” Trump also called him and left a voicemail.
President Donald Trump, surrounded by cheering MAGA supporters at a campaign rally in New Hampshire Thursday, took it upon himself to criticize the weight of someone he at least thought was a heckler.
“That guy’s got a serious weight problem. Go home, start exercising,” Trump told the crowd in Manchester. “Get him out of here, please.”
The attention of the president — who doesn’t exercise outside of golfing — was apparently drawn to the person after supporters stopped paying attention to him. Video taken at the rally shows attendants twisting their heads to look at several people exiting the arena to loud booing. Trump stopped mid-speech to turn around and watch with them.
“Got a bigger problem than I do,” Trump said. “Got a bigger problem than all of us. Now he goes home and his mom says, ‘What the hell have you just done?’”
But it’s not clear if Trump was even insulting the right person. Jennifer Jacobs, a reporter from Bloomberg News who attended the rally, said that one of the president’s supporters, who was bigger in stature, had flagged the protesters to security, but the protesters themselves were thin.
Of course, it’s not unusual for Trump to mock people he doesn’t like. Trump once made fun of a disabled New York Times reporter during a rally in 2015. He also called Stormy Daniels, the adult film star who was paid off to keep quiet about her affair with him, “horseface.”
Apart from criticizing the protesters Thursday, Trump otherwise spent much of his campaign rally Thursday bashing his opponents. He also argued that the economy would collapse without him and voiced his support for gun ownership, despite deadly mass shootings in Ohio and Texas this month.
“We are continuing our incredible movement,” he said. “Our movement is built on love.”
Cover image: President Donald Trump speaks to supporters at a rally in Manchester on August 15, 2019 in Manchester, New Hampshire. (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)
