At this point, we should no longer be surprised when Donald Trump turns a seemingly benign event into a highly inappropriate political rally, and yet here we are. Did you think that his health care press conference would be the only insane thing of the day? Well, you would be wrong. On Monday evening, our POTUS attended the Boy Scouts of America’s annual Jamboree in West Virginia and preceded to give a strange and politically charged speech to 40,000 Scouts.
On top of attacking Hillary Clinton and former President Barack Obama (who was actually a Boy Scout) and bragging about his election victory, Trump also promised to repeal Obamacare (and fire Secretary of Health and Human Services Tom Price if the legislation doesn’t pass), prompting the crowd to break out in chants of “U-S-A! U-S-A!” Trump also went on to ominously harp on the Scout value, loyalty, saying “As the scout law says, a scout is trustworthy, loyal. We could use some more loyalty, I will tell you that.”
Speaking to Boy Scouts, Pres. Trump quips Sec. Price "better get the votes" for health care bill, or he'll fire him. https://t.co/di8wjEHH3J
— NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt (@NBCNightlyNews) July 24, 2017
While the political leaning was totally out of place at an event like this, Trump took it a step beyond that, telling the Scouts present how awesome it was to own a yacht and how a friend of his totally got laid all the time.
“[My friend] sold his company for a tremendous amount of money, and he went out a bought a big yacht. And he had a very… interesting life. I won’t go into any more than that ‘cause you’re Boy Scouts. So I’m not going to tell you what he did.”
Talk about family values, amirite? Trump also touted the popular Republican party line about the so-called War on Christmas, saying, “Under a Trump Administration, you’ll be saying ‘Merry Christmas’ again as you go shopping.” One can’t help but feel deeply uncomfortable to see such a politicized speech targeting impressionable young people, and it’s safe to say that the Boy Scouts will be facing some backlash in the coming days.
And, just in case you were wondering, yes, former White House photographer Pete Souza did indeed have a perfect burn on Instagram.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BW8u34hl0Rv/?taken-by=petesouza&hl=en