Donald Trump reportedly made a racist assumption about a group of racially diverse congressional staff members at a White House reception held early in his presidency.
According to an advance copy of New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman’s book, Confidence Man, which was obtained by Rolling Stone, Trump assumed the staffers were waiters ― and told them to get some food.
Reince Priebus, who was White House chief of staff at the time, told Trump they were top congressional aides, then went to find the actual waiters for him, the magazine reported.
Trump had a history of racist, sexist and xenophobic behavior long before he sought the presidency, and which he took with him to the White House. He was also among the leading voices behind the racist “birther” conspiracy theory, which claimed that then-President Barack Obama was a secret Muslim who wasn’t born in the United States.
When he moved into the White House after Obama, Trump told a visitor he had the bathrooms remodeled, per Confidence Man.
“You understand what I’m talking about,” he told the guest, who interpreted that “to mean Trump did not want to use the same bathroom as his Black predecessor.”
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