WASHINGTON -- Billionaire eccentric Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump said on Sunday that he did not owe Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) an apology after stating that the senator is only viewed as a war hero because he was held captive and that Trump likes “people who weren’t captured.”
“No. Not at all,” Trump responded to ABC’s Martha Raddatz when asked if he owed McCain, who was held for five and a half years as a prisoner of war in Vietnam, an apology.
Later in the interview, Trump demanded an apology from McCain for the senator stating that the billionaire candidate was firing up the “crazies” with his anti-immigrant rhetoric.
“And by the way, this all started, Martha, when we had thousands and thousands of people in Phoenix, Arizona, and John -- who, by the way, are devastated by illegal immigration, something I'm very proud to have brought to the forefront,” Trump said. “We had thousands of people and he said they're all crazies. He called them crazies. And frankly, I think he owes them an apology.”
Trump went on to deflect the negative attention toward him, saying it comes only because low-polling candidates “started attacking me.”
Raddatz questioned Trump about his routine use of insults and put-downs like “dummy” or “loser” when confronted or contested by other candidates or political figures, and whether that would be “beneath the office of the president” were he to win. Trump did not seem to think it was.
She then asked Trump if he has said anything he ever regretted, including his comments about immigration or “the birther issue.”
“No, I wouldn’t do that. I wouldn’t do that, Martha. I wouldn’t do that. It’s not the appropriate time,” Trump responded. “But certainly I have said things that I could’ve held back. But not that often, surprisingly not that often, but certainly there have been occasions.”