Trump doesn't mind if people call him a 'xenophobe' because 'How many people even know what that word means?'

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published 30 June 2016

Donald Trump waved away charges that he is a "xenophobe" and a "nativist" with the suggestion that these words are too difficult for the average voter to understand anyway — at least, that's what Boston radio host Howie Carr said following a conversation with Trump on the candidate's personal plane.

Carr mentioned a sighting of anti-Trump protesters in Boston, one of whom was waving a sign which read, "RACIST SEXIST BIGOT FASCIST XENOPHOBE ISLAMOPHOBE TRUMP."

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During the same conversation, Trump offered Carr some public relations advice. "Whatever you do, don't apologize," Trump said. "You never hear me apologize, do you? That's what killed Jimmy the Greek way back. Remember? He was doing okay 'til he said he was sorry."

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Bonnie Kristian was a deputy editor and acting editor-in-chief of TheWeek.com. She is a columnist at Christianity Today and author of Untrustworthy: The Knowledge Crisis Breaking Our Brains, Polluting Our Politics, and Corrupting Christian Community (forthcoming 2022) and A Flexible Faith: Rethinking What It Means to Follow Jesus Today (2018). Her writing has also appeared at Time Magazine, CNN, USA Today, Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, and The American Conservative, among other outlets.