Trump Dismisses Commercial Losses: ‘I’m Very Rich. It Doesn’t Matter to Me.’

This Wednesday, Republican pre-candidate for the U.S. presidency Donald Trump minimized the economic losses he has suffered after disastrous declarations about illegal immigration. “The values they are commenting about are very large, but for me, they are insignificant,”* he affirmed in an interview with the broadcaster CNN. “But fortunately, I am very rich. It doesn’t matter to me,” he insisted.

Last June 16, when he announced his intention to run for the White House in 2016, Trump harshly criticized Mexican immigrants, saying they are transmitting “infectious disease,” and proposed building a “great wall” on the southern frontier of the USA. Because of those declarations, the mogul suffered criticism of all types, lost various commercial partners and had contracts cancelled with networks such as NBC, ESPN and Univision, and organizers of sporting events such as Nascar Racing.

If he gets to the White House, the magnate reiterated he would construct a large “impenetrable wall”* on the border with Mexico, criticizing Obama for letting more illegal immigrants in during his term than any previous administration. “More people right now are in this country illegally than ever before,” he said. Trump, however, stressed that his criticism was directed at illegal Mexican immigrants, not at the country.

Trump also discounted an article in The Washington Post, which revealed the existence of illegal workers in one of the hotels he is building in the U.S. capital. “I wish they would give us some names,” he said, emphasizing his policy of only giving business to those companies that hire legal immigrants, although noting there are between 11 and 34 million people living illegally in the USA.

On other subjects, he stated that if elected, he would order the destruction of oil fields in Iraq controlled by the Islamic State to cut off the flow of income to the terrorists. “I would bomb the hell out of the oil fields,” he said, guaranteeing that it would be easier to reconstruct them after the jihadis were expelled. Asked about the possibility of entering the presidential race as an independent candidate in case he was not chosen in the Republican primaries, Trump said that the best way of overthrowing the Democrats is to maintain the party. Since he launched his campaign, the magnate has risen to second place in the polls among Republicans, trailing only former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush.

*Editor’s note: Correctly translated, this quote could not be verified.