So former President Donald Trump didn’t completely lie about his near-death experience in the helicopter, but the 2024 Republican presidential candidate got some details mixed up.
For example, the black man Trump confused with former San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown was actually former Los Angeles City Councilman and Senator Nate Holden.
“I guess we all look the same,” Holden said in an interview with Politico. He added, “Willie is the little black guy who lives in San Francisco. I’m a big black guy who lives in Los Angeles.”
Despite his own mistake, The New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman told CNN that Trump had threatened to sue the newspaper for reporting that Brown had denied the incident.
Trump claimed he had recordings proving the incident and mocked Haberman when she asked to see them.
“He made fun of me for asking that in a sort of childish sing-song voice,” Haberman said. But she said the most interesting thing about her conversation with Trump was that he was focused on proving the incident rather than on his presidential campaign.
“He focused on it because we’ve seen him do it in the past when he’s been in stressful situations,” Haberman said.
The embarrassing racial confusion comes as a result of a new survey by The New York Times/Siena College shows that Trump’s black opponent Kamala Harris is currently ahead of him in three swing states.
The poll found that Harris is now four percentage points ahead of Trump in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. In all of these states, 50 percent of respondents said they would likely vote for Harris, while 46 percent favor Trump.
Race is still a problem for Trump, and the fact that he mistook one black man for another during his infamous helicopter ride will not help him.
Holden, now 95, told Politico that Trump had considered developing the site of a historic Los Angeles hotel around 1999 and that he had approved the project as a senator for the district.
Holden and Trump met at Trump Tower in Manhattan and planned to fly over to Atlantic City, New Jersey, by helicopter to tour Trump’s new Taj Mahal casino. But, as Trump correctly reported, things took a shocking turn on the way there.
Donald Trump in his office at Trump Tower in 1999.
Michael Brennan
On the helicopter were Holden, Trump, Trump’s late brother Robert, attorney Harvey Freedman and Barbara Res, Trump’s former vice chairman for construction and development.
As Res wrote in her book: All alone on the 68th floor (2013): “Shortly afterward, the pilot informed us that he had lost some instruments and that we would have to make an emergency landing,” she wrote. “By now the helicopter was shaking like crazy.”
Res told Politico on Friday that Trump liked to say Holden had “turned white.” But Holden said it was Trump who was truly afraid.
“He was white as snow,” said Holden. “And he was scared to death.”
And as far as Holden remembers, the subject of Vice President Kamala Harris was not raised, contrary to Trump’s claims.
Former Senator Nate Holden and developer Erika Alexis.
Tommaso Boddi/Getty Images for Heart of Los Angeles
“Either he confused it,” Holden said. “Or he made it up.”
He added: “This was just too big to miss. This is a big deal. Mixing up Willie Brown and me? The press is looking for the real story and they haven’t found it. They have it.”
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