President Barack Obama on Sunday waded into the firestorm over newly surfaced remarks made by Donald Trump calling the Republican presidential nominee “insecure.”
“One of the most disturbing things about this election is just the unbelievable rhetoric coming from the top of the Republican ticket,” Obama said while giving a speech to about 250 donors at a Democratic campaign fundraiser on the South Side to benefit U.S. Rep. Tammy Duckworth in her race against Republican U.S. Sen. Mark Kirk.
“Demeaning women, degrading women, but also minorities, immigrants, people of other faiths, mocking the disabled, insulting our troops, insulting our veterans,” Obama said. “It tells you that he’s insecure enough that he pumps himself up by putting other people down. Not a character trait that I would advise for somebody in the Oval Office.”
Obama’s remarks came at the tail end of a weekend that had been consumed by outrage across the political spectrum over a 2005 video in which Trump brags about using his celebrity status to kiss and grope women.
The video, published Friday by The Washington Post, contains audio of Trump’s remarks while he was riding in a bus preparing for a taping of a segment for NBC’s “Access Hollywood.” Trump is heard describing attempts to have sex with a married woman and saying of “beautiful women,” “I just start kissing them. It’s like a magnet. Just kiss. I don’t even wait. And when you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything . . . Grab them by the p—-. You can do anything.”
The remarks drew a rebuke from Trump’s running mate, Indiana Gov. Mike Pence, led to a stream of defections from Republicans who said they could no longer back the nominee and sparked a chorus of calls for Trump to drop out of the race.
While Obama did not reference the tape specifically, he said he would not “repeat” the remarks he was referring to. “There are children in the room,” he said.
Obama landed in Chicago on Friday before the video had surfaced. He cast an early ballot at a hometown polling place and attended two fundraisers to help Democrats, including one event at which his remarks to donors were public. He stayed off the topic of Trump at that event, saying only that, “The stakes in this election are extraordinary.”
Obama kept out of the public eye Saturday and stayed off the roads Sunday morning as the Chicago Marathon was under way.
The Sunday afternoon event at the Stony Island Arts Bank in the Greater Grand Crossing neighborhood was a $1,000-a-ticket fundraiser to benefit Duckworth and Illinois Victory 2016, a joint venture between Duckworth and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.
Donors packed into the venue, once an abandoned bank building that was recently rehabbed by Chicago artist Theaster Gates to house magazines, books, records and other collectibles. Attendees included U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin, U.S. Rep. Cheri Bustos, U.S. Rep. Robin Kelly, Secretary of State Jesse White, Illinois Treasurer Mike Frerichs, Chicago City Clerk and Democratic comptroller candidate Susana Mendoza, state Sen. Kwame Raoul and Illinois House Majority Leader Barbara Flynn Currie.
Duckworth, a two-term congresswoman from Hoffman Estates, is challenging Kirk, a one-term Republican senator, in a contest that Democrats are hoping could help tip the balance of power in the Senate in their favor. The seat in question is the same one that was held by Obama before he entered the White House.
Trump has been a central issue in the campaign, as Kirk sought early on to distance himself from the reality TV star’s controversial candidacy. He’s been airing an ad in which he calls Trump “not fit to be commander in chief.” And he has an ad in Spanish in which he says that “when Donald Trump says bad things about immigrants, I have spoken out against him . . . I don’t support Trump.”
On Friday night, Kirk posted a message on Twitter calling on Trump to drop out, something the presidential candidate has said won’t be happening. Kirk also has floated the idea of casting a write-in vote for David Petraeus, a vote that would be merely symbolic because the retired Army general is not registered as a write-in candidate in Illinois.
Obama’s remarks about Trump came after he heaped praise on Duckworth, an Iraq war veteran, as “a tireless advocate on behalf of her fellow veterans.”
“She’s a tough lady but with a big heart,” Obama said.
Obama also took the opportunity to tick off his accomplishments as president and warn Democrats that “all that progress is at stake in this election.”
“We should be building on that success and creating more progress. But if we don’t do our jobs in this election, it can all be wiped away,” he said.
Obama was introduced by Duckworth, who repeatedly referred to the president as Chicago’s “favorite son.”
“He has been a transformative and historic president and the country is better off today than it was when he took office,” Duckworth said.
The Obama event raised at least $350,000, according to the Duckworth campaign.
kgeiger@chicagotribune.com
Twitter @kimgeiger
