{"id":23253,"date":"2015-10-27T08:00:49","date_gmt":"2015-10-27T15:00:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spijue.wpengine.com\/news\/trump-says-his-father-gave-him-a-small-1-million-loan\/"},"modified":"2015-10-27T08:00:49","modified_gmt":"2015-10-27T15:00:49","slug":"trump-says-his-father-gave-him-a-small-1-million-loan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/news\/trump-says-his-father-gave-him-a-small-1-million-loan\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump says his father gave him a ‘small’ $1 million loan"},"content":{"rendered":"

ATKINSON, N.H. \u2014<\/strong> How about some humility, Donald Trump?<\/p>\n

At a rare town hall event Monday for a man who goes for big rallies, some potential voters wanted to see a common touch from the tower-building billionaire in his quest for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination.<\/p>\n

He said in reply that he ate at McDonald\u2019s on Sunday, often drives himself and got started in business with a \u201csmall loan\u201d of $1 million from his dad.<\/p>\n

The event, a televised town hall broadcast live on the \u201cToday\u201d show, brought together about 125 registered voters in a country club ballroom. The intimate environment was a rarity for the GOP front-runner, who has generally eschewed small events in favor of rallies drawing thousands of rowdy and loyal backers.<\/p>\n

While a handful of questions addressed Trump\u2019s policy positions, many focused on his persona as a brash TV entertainer and whether he possessed the ability to come back down to earth.<\/p>\n

\u201cI know a lot of people would really want to vote for you if only you would eat a piece of humble pie once in a while,\u201d said one woman, an undecided registered Republican, who asked Trump whether he had any weaknesses he might share.<\/p>\n

\u201cWell I\u2019d like to do that,\u201d Trump responded, \u201cbut then I\u2019d expose the weaknesses to Putin and everybody else and we don\u2019t want to do that, right?\u201d He was referring to Russian President Vladimir Putin.<\/p>\n

Another questioner, identified as an undecided Republican, asked Trump whether, with the exception of his family, he\u2019d ever been told \u201cno.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI mean, my whole life really has been a \u2018no,\u2019\u201d Trump said. \u201cAnd I fought through it.\u201d Trump is the son of a successful real estate developer who gave him seed money to begin investing in Manhattan real estate.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt has not been easy for me,\u201d Trump added. \u201cAnd I started off in Brooklyn, my father gave me a small loan of $1 million. I came into Manhattan and I had to pay him back, and I had to pay him back with interest.\u201d<\/p>\n

Host Matt Lauer quickly noted that most voters would not consider $1 million a small amount.<\/p>\n

Unlike 2012 GOP nominee Mitt Romney, Trump has fully embraced his wealth in the campaign trail, often bragging about his riches, to little ill effect.<\/p>\n

Still, Trump did show some signs of relatability in talking about his recent fast-food stop and his tendency to get behind the wheel.<\/p>\n

During a commercial break, Trump half-jokingly protested the fact that so many of the questioners were undecided. He said he wanted to hear from some backers.<\/p>\n

Trump was also pushed for more specifics. One attendee, a student at Saint Anselm College in nearby Manchester, said he felt that Trump\u2019s campaign has been \u201cbased more on talking points than substance.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cDo you have a specific plan for how to bring our economy back, or should middle class voters just elect you because your name\u2019s Trump?\u201d the student asked.<\/p>\n

Trump was unapologetic.<\/p>\n

\u201cWell I think they should,\u201d he said, \u201cbecause I built a great company.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mark Casey, a registered independent, pressed the candidate on how he would deal with world leaders.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat would you say to people like me who have concern that you\u2019ll be dealing with a lot of world leaders you might not see eye-to-eye with, and you can\u2019t fire them?\u201d he asked. \u201cBut you could start a war by calling them a loser or an idiot.\u201d<\/p>\n

Trump told Casey that he\u2019d shown restraint throughout the campaign, an assertion bound to raise eyebrows from the political rivals who\u2019ve been subjected to his zingers. He said he knows how to be politically correct when needed.<\/p>\n

Casey said afterward that Trump\u2019s answer was just what he was looking to hear.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think that\u2019s what the country needs,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ATKINSON, N.H. \u2014 How about some humility, Donald Trump? At a rare town hall event Monday for a man who goes for big rallies, some potential voters wanted to see a common touch from the tower-building billionaire in his quest for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination. He said in reply that he ate at McDonald\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":107,"featured_media":23254,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","wds_primary_category":4,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[65],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-23253","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-nation-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23253","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/107"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23253"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23253\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23254"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23253"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23253"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23253"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=23253"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}