New Delhi: US President Trump has joked about
emulating China’s Xi Jinping’s efforts at a powergrab that would make him “president-forlife”.
The comments came not at a jokey, backslapping evening at the annual Gridiron Club meeting in Washington but at a fundraiser earlier in the day at his Mar-a-Lago estate, where he hosted Xi last April. “He’s now president for life. President for life. And he’s great,” Trump told Republican donors, according to a recording CNN obtained.
“And look, he was able to do that. I think it’s great. Maybe we’ll give that a shot some day.”
While the tone suggested he might have been kidding — the comment generated laughter — some critics pointed to his oft-expressed penchant for parades and pageantry to wonder if the US President harboured dictatorial thoughts.
“But whether this was a joke or not, talking about being President for life like Xi Jinping is the most unAmerican sentiment expressed by an American President. George Washington would roll over in his grave,” tweeted Ro Khanna, Democratic Congressman from California. Another columnist noted that “if Trump hadn’t already expressed admiration for a catalog of authoritarians... and his intense love affair with Putin, I might be willing to cut him slack on Xi”.
But a few hours after the Mar-a-Lago bombshell, the US President walked into the lion’s den so to say — the annual Gridiron Club dinner where the media and the establishment joke and josh bonhomously with each other, and which he had stayed away from last year.
Some of his jokes were outstanding, although some critics carped about how he insulted his wife and family.
“So many people have been leaving the White House,” Trump said of recent staff turnover. “It’s invigourating since you want turnover. I like chaos. It really is good. Who’s going to be the next to leave? Steve Miller, or Melania?” In an oblique reference to the #freemelaniahashtag, he insisted, “She’s actually having a great time.”
He also lined up his son-inlaw Jared Kushner, saying, in reference to his recent security clearance woes, “We were late tonight because Jared could not get through security.”