Since the weekend, President Trump has been denounced by Kanye West and Martellus Bennett, the New England Patriots’ tight end. The president also made polarizing statements on Twitter and at a press conference. Here’s a rundown of what happened and why it matters.
Kanye West deletes tweets defending Trump meeting
West deleted tweets defending his December meeting with Trump sometime between Sunday night and Monday morning, according to CNN. West met him at Trump Tower to dsicuss bullying, supporting teachers, modernizing curriculums and violence in Chicago, West tweeted.
After the meeting, West also tweeted a picture of a signed copy of TIME’s “Person of the Year” issue with Trump on the cover. This tweet has also been deleted.
New England Patriots’ tight end to skip White House visit
Bennett told reporters after the Patriots’ Super Bowl win Sunday he will not accompany his teammates to the White House to be honored by Trump later this year.
“I am not going to go,” he said. “I can elaborate later on in life. Right now I am just trying to enjoy this. If you want to know how I feel about it, just follow me on Twitter.”
Bennett advocates for the Black Lives Matter movement and denounced West on Twitter for meeting with Trump.
Bennett told reporters he is “not really worried” about backlash from skipping the White House meeting and the team avoids talking politics in the locker room.
Trump announced the day before the general election that Patriots quarterback Tom Brady and Coach Bill Belichick were supporting his campaign, according to CNN.
Brady’s wife, supermodel Gisele Bündchen, denied the reports on social media.
Trump tweets “any negative polls are fake news”
Trump tweeted Monday, “Any negative polls are fake news, just like the CNN, ABC, NBC polls in the election. Sorry, people want border security and extreme vetting.”
This was in response to a CNN/ORC poll found 6 in 10 people opposed Trump’s wall on the Mexican border and 53 percent of respondents said they opposed Trump’s immigration executive order, according to Fox News.
Trump tweeted, “I call my own shots, largely based on an accumulation of data, and everyone knows it. Some FAKE NEWS media, in order to marginalize, lies!”
Trump promises strong support for NATO
Trump vowed to support NATO Monday at United States Central Command headquarters in Florida.
“We strongly support NATO,” Trump said. “We only ask that all of the NATO members make their full and proper financial contributions to the NATO alliance, which many of them have not been doing. Many of them have not been even close, and they have to do that.”
Trump made contradictory comments regarding NATO throughout his campaign. He called NATO membership obsolete and ill-prepared to confront modern-day threats, according to CNN. However, his comments Monday signified he would maintain support of U.S. membership and push other countries to meet the budget requirements of spending 2 percent of their GDP on defense.
