ESPN host Stephen A. Smith defended former President Donald Trump’s character in an interview, although he added he wouldn’t vote for him in 2024.
Smith, the star of ESPN’s sports talk program “First Take”, made the comments while speaking at the Semafor Media Summit.
He shared that the and Trump had a good relationship in the past and enjoyed discussing sports at Trump’s events, which Smith attended.
“I knew Trump before he ran for the presidency. I thoroughly enjoyed talking to him. He was a huge sports fan. He used to throw a lot of events at … you know, at his casinos and stuff like that, and I genuinely liked them,” Smith said at the Summit.
Trump has a long history of involvement with sports. His Atlantic City Plaza was a popular destination for prizefights and he owns 17 golf clubs throughout the world.
“I didn’t know who this guy was running for president. I think he’s changed, but I will tell you this: I think when people call him racist and stuff like that, I’ve never thought of Trump that way. It’s not, he’s not against Black people,” Smith added. “He’s against old things not named Trump.”
Smith said he holds conservative views and could vote for a Republican for president, but he’s “beyond voting for Trump” at this point.
He said rather than Trump’s politics, it’s his “statesmanship” that turned Smith off. He said the president should be someone who brings the country together instead of dividing it further.
Smith has previously lambasted the idea of progressives in power and is critical of Democrats’ policies on crime.
“There is no question that we should be against an extremely progressive agenda that is calling for people to be released from prison on multiple occasions, that’s ignoring a lot of crime that’s taking place in the streets,” he said to Fox News.
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“He said the president should be someone who brings the country together instead of dividing it further.” I think this is coming from Trump’s relationship with the media. I don’t think Smith realizes that quotes taken out of context are FAKE NEWS and was something that Trump had to deal with from day one.