Trump Calls Shootings In Minnesota, Louisiana 'Terrible, Disgusting'
MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) – Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican candidate for the White House, called the recent shootings of black men in Minnesota and Louisiana "terrible, disgusting performances" by the officers involved.
During an interview Tuesday with Fox News' Bill O'Reilly, the businessman candidate wondered aloud whether the officers involved in the fatal shootings of Philando Castile and Alton Sterling had the proper training, or if they "choked or got scared or nervous."
In regards to the Castile shooting, which happened last Wednesday in Falcon Heights, Trump said it was "really bad," but left room to acknowledge that the officer involved, Jeronimo Yanez of the St. Anthony Police Department, could have reacted to Castile as he reached behind himself during the traffic stop.
Castile, 32, was armed and documents show he had a permit to carry. His girlfriend live-streamed the immediate aftermath of the shooting, and the video went viral, prompting international outrage.
A day before the Castile shooting, Sterling was fatally shot on the ground outside a store in Baton Rouge where he sold CDs. Trump's response to that shooting was more direct.
"The man who was being stepped on and then shot, I looked at that in particular and thought: 'Wow, that's bad, that's bad,'" the Republican candidate said.
Trump said both shootings could be the result of a lack of training or the officers simply being "bad people."
Later in the interview, he said that most police officers in America do a phenomenal job, and expressed outrage over the shooting in Dallas last week that left five officers dead.
When asked about race in America, Trump said that black Americans "aren't necessary wrong" when they say their experience with police is different than that of whites. The comment is not too dissimilar from what Gov. Mark Dayton said in regards to the Castile shooting: That the cafeteria worker wouldn't likely have been shot if he were white -- a comment for which the governor was widely criticized.
During his interview with O'Reilly, Trump said the country needs a cheerleader, not a divider, as he described President Barack Obama.
The activist group Black Lives Matter, he said, was also part of the problem.
"The term is very divisive," Trump said. "They are dividing America."