Barbara Res worked for Donald Trump for over 18 years, then she fell from grace. In an interview, she now makes serious allegations against her former boss – and comments on how he has changed in recent years.
Donald Trump is known for many things – but not for his restraint. Recently, however, his verbal outbursts in public have increased. But decades ago, Trump is said to have made tasteless jokes in private circles. He even did not shy away from Holocaust jokes.
Barbara Res reported this in a recent interview with “MSNBC”. Res had worked as a high-ranking manager for the then real estate mogul since 1980, and was responsible for the construction of the famous Trump Tower. At some point, Trump wanted to boast to the management team about the new hiring of a German engineer. And suddenly, in front of some Jewish employees, he used the wrong tone.
Donald Trump made Holocaust jokes: “We were shocked”
“He boasted to the management team about what a great guy he was. A real German, very neat and clean,” recalls Res. “He looked at a number of management members who happened to be Jewish and said: ‘Watch out for this guy, he hasn’t forgotten the ovens.'” Then he grinned broadly.
“We were all shocked,” she recalls. “I couldn’t believe he had just said that. But he was really joking about the Nazi ovens and killing people.”
“That was his humor”
The anecdote was prompted by a question from moderator Ali Velshi about the recent outbursts and increasingly confused stories of presidential candidate Trump. He had recently praised the fictional serial killer Hannibal Lecter and asked his fans whether they would rather be shocked to death by a ship’s battery or eaten by a shark.
Res believes she can at least clearly classify the Lecter story. “I don’t think he wanted to praise him. They were more like jokes, he thinks it’s funny that Hannibal Lecter ate people,” she interprets. “That was his humor, it was fine.”
Trump relies on Jewish voters
The anecdote about the Holocaust jokes comes at a very bad time for Trump. He had just tried to use the ongoing Gaza conflict and the increasingly distant position of his competitor Joe Biden to his own advantage, courting Jewish voters. And had even described himself as the “best president for the Jews.”
His confession of Christianity is actually hypocritical. “The fact that he is now emphasizing his religiosity is absolute nonsense. He hated Christmas because he only had to go to church once a year,” Res says. “He is an agnostic, perhaps even an atheist. He made fun of religious people mercilessly. He thought they were stupid.” However, she believes that the religious right in the USA also believes in hatred of homosexuals and other minorities rather than in Jesus’ message of love. “That’s why they voted for him.”
Settling accounts with the ex-boss
Barbara Res worked for Donald Trump until 1998 before breaking with him because of his treatment of employees and especially women. In her 2020 book “Tower of Lies,” she took Trump to task. She warned extensively about her former boss when he first ran for president in 2016.
The current presidential candidate Trump is, however, very different from the Donald Trump she worked for back then, she explains. “Back then, he let people talk to him, listened and took advice. He knew that there were people who knew more about a topic than he did,” she explains. “That’s over. He doesn’t listen to anyone anymore. He really believes that he knows everything better than everyone else. You can’t control him anymore.”
Sources:MSNBC, New York Times