Report: Christie “Misspoke” About Trump Donating to Hurricane Sandy Relief
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, left, gives a thumbs up to the crowd as he is introduced by New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, right, at a rally at Lenoir-Rhyne University in Hickory, N.C., Monday, March 14, 2016.
New Jersey governor Chris Christie told a heartwarming Trump story during the Republican National Convention yesterday.
But it might not necessarily be true.
According to The Washington Post, Christie told a group of Republican delegates Monday morning that after Hurricane Sandy hit in 2012, his wife, Mary Pat Christie, asked Donald Trump to donate to her New Jersey disaster relief fund.
According to Christie’s story, Trump asked how much the check should be and then said, “Just tell me and I’ll send it,” northjersey.com reports.
Either Trump never actually promised to send money, or he didn’t follow through, according to reports.
A spokesman for Christie, Brian Murray, said Monday night that Christie “misspoke,” according to The Washington Post. Murray said Trump never donated to Mary Pat Christie’s Hurricane Sandy New Jersey Relief Fund, but that Trump had instead donated to “other New Jersey charities, including the Drumthwacket Foundation,” the newspaper reports.
The Donald J. Trump Foundation has supplied the Drumthwacket Foundation with more than $40,000 since 2010, the Post found. But though Trump controls the Donald J. Trump Foundation, he hasn’t put any of his own money in the foundation since 2008, according to the Post. Officials at the Drumthwacket Foundation told the newspaper that Trump has never donated to the organization out of his own pocket.
Either way, the Drumthwacket foundation has little to do with Hurricane Sandy relief — it’s geared toward the governor’s estate.
Trump recently withdrew the Post‘s press credentials from his campaign events after the newspaper examined his claim that he’s given millions of dollars to charities. The Post said it has found just one donation from Trump to a charity between 2008 and this past May: Less than $10,000 to a New York chapter of the Police Athletic League in 2009.
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