Barry Diller, the founder and chairman of IAC Interactive, knows show biz and New York real estate—and he is not impressed with the New York real estate mogul and superlative showman currently topping national politics polls.
“All he is is a huckster,” Diller said of Donald Trump. “Somebody who learned long ago in real estate that if you can make a big name for yourself, it can get you an extra dollar.” In addition to questioning the Republican front-runner’s motivation for running, Diller attacked Trump for appealing to the nation’s worser angels. “He’s a self-promoting huckster who found a vein,” Diller continued. “A vein of meanness and nastiness.”
Speaking with Erik Schatzker at the Bloomberg Markets Most Influential Summit, Diller vowed to pick up stakes if Trump becomes President Barack Obama’s successor. “If Donald Trump doesn’t fall, I’ll either move out of the country or join the resistance,” he said. But Diller expressed his certainty that a Trump presidency will never happen. He said he’d put his money on it.
Over the years, the media mogul has indeed put major money on political causes, most of them Democratic. According to records on file at the Federal Election Commission, he has contributed to former Senator (and current Democratic presidential front-runner) Hillary Clinton, Senator Cory Booker of New Jersey, Vice President Joseph Biden, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, Senator Charles Schumer of New York, and Sean Eldridge, a gay rights activist who ran unsuccessfully for Congress last year. Before the 2008 presidential race, Diller gave to Barack Obama . . . and to Obama’s Republican opponent, Senator John McCain of Arizona. Diller spoke in defense of his favorite Republican today, as he analyzed the environment that’s feeding Trump’s unexpected political rise.
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SOURCE: Emily Greenhouse
Bloomberg
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