President's niece Mary Trump claims she has heard him use the N-word and anti-Semitic slurs
Mary Trump, the niece of President Donald Trump, has written a tell-all book, "Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World's Most Dangerous Man," about what she calls a "dysfunctional" and "dangerous" Trump family. She has done several interviews with major news outlets to promote the book, including one with the Washington Post published on Thursday, in which she claimed her uncle, President Trump, is "clearly racist."
"Growing up, it was sort of normal to hear them use the n-word or use anti-Semitic expressions," Mary Trump said in the Post interview.
When asked about this claim during an interview with MSNBC's Rachel Maddow on Thursday, Mary Trump doubled down and expanded upon on her remarks. Maddow asked her if she just "generally" heard these words used by her family or if she heard Mr. Trump specifically use them.
"Just generally, with the older generations. As if it were common place and ordinary to say such things," Mary Trump replied, adding that she did not share her family's views.
Maddow pressed her again, asking if she ever heard her uncle, the president, use racist or anti-Semitic slurs. "Oh, yeah, of course I did," Mary Trump said. "And I don't think that should surprise anybody given how virulently racist he is today."
Maddow again asked Mary Trump if she specifically heard Mr. Trump use the N-word and anti-Semitic slurs. She responded "yes" to both.
The MSNBC host said her team followed up with the White House about the claims. The White House issued a statement saying Mary Trump's book is "a book of falsehoods, plain and simple. The president doesn't use those words."
Mary Trump does not make the claims in her book, Maddow said. Only in interviews has she said she's heard the president use racial slurs.
The president's Chief of Staff Mark Meadows said in an on-cam gaggle on Thursday that he had never heard Mr. Trump use that language.
In the Washington Post interview, Mary Trump, who is gay, also addressed her experience with homophobia in her family. "Homophobia was never an issue because nobody ever talked about gay people, well, until my grandmother called Elton John" a slur, she said, according to the Washington Post.
Mary Trump is the daughter of Mr. Trump's elder brother Frederick Trump Jr., who died in 1981 at the age of 42 after struggling with alcoholism. The book gives an intimate, first-hand account of the president's upbringing and rise to one of the most powerful positions in the world.
The book was published by ViacomCBS subsidiary Simon & Schuster on Tuesday after Mr. Trump tried to silence his niece. The Trump family had argued that Mary Trump violated the 2001 terms of patriarch Fred Trump's estate by writing the tell-all, but a judge denied their request.
The judge lifted the temporary restraining order on Mary Trump, allowing her to speak freely ahead of the publication of the book.