Many have wondered whether Donald Trump has ever set foot in a public school. He has said during the campaign that he LOVES, LOVES, LOVES” charter schools. In that sense, he is allied with Peter Cunningham of Education Post, Campbell Brown of The 74, the billionaire Waltons, the billionaire Gates, the billionaire Eli Broad, and every Republican governor.
It is unknown whether he has ever visited a charter school.
But there is documentary proof that he did visit a New York City public school 19 years ago, when he participated in a program called “Principal for a Day,” sponsored by a civic group called PENCIL.
Trump visited PS 70, and his idea of generosity was to hold a lottery for 300 students in fifth grade, with only 15 winners, who would get free Nike sneakers at the Nike store in Trump Tower. Here is the contemporary account of his visit by the New York Times. The chess team was trying to raise money to go to an out-of-town tournament, and the fabulously wealthy Trump chipped in a measly $200.
When he learned later that many children were upset because they lost the lottery, he increased the number of free sneakers.
The New York Times reported:
“For his first act as Principal for a Day at Public School 70 in the Bronx, Donald J. Trump — the Trump of the high-rolling hotels and chandelier-encrusted casinos — gave a speech to an auditorium full of fifth graders.
Make the speech inspiring, he was asked, something to encourage a group of children whose universe is one of New York City’s most disadvantaged neighborhoods and whose school is so impoverished that it has been scratching and scrimping for enough money to take its championship chess team to the national competition in Tennessee this spring.
Mr. Trump glided to the microphone.
”First of all, who likes Nike sneakers?” he asked. All 300 fifth graders raised their hands. Mr. Trump leaned in to drop the bombshell. ”If everybody puts their name on a piece of paper right now, I will pick 15 people and I’ll take you to the new Nike store that I just opened at Trump Tower.”
The fifth graders erupted in frenzied excitement at the promise of a trip to what Mr. Trump described as the ”inner city called 57th and Fifth.” But a little while later, 11-year-old Andres Rodriguez had a question.
”Why,” asked Andres, whose father is dead and whose mother cannot work because of a bad leg, ”did you offer us sneakers if you could give us scholarships?”
It was a split second that split the distance wide open between the world of P.S. 70 and the celebrity constellation of Mr. Trump, who did not go to public school and whose children do not either.”
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Reblogged this on David R. Taylor-Thoughts on Education and commented:
Way to go Andres!!
Trump needs to be janitor for a day and clean the lavatories with a very small toothbrush.
Trump is an ass and has always been an ass
Trump doesn’t have an ass. Do snakes have an ass – no, they do not have butts? They have an anus, and Trump’s anus is below his nose and above his chin. When he speaks, he hisses venom.
The “inner city called 57th and Fifth.” Anyone who knows that corner will appreciate the grotesquely bitter irony of that locution.
Reblogged this on DCGEducator: Doing The Right Thing and commented:
Scholarships, not sneakers!
Scholarships, not sneakers!
Fair enough, and a striking illustration. However, the democratic candidates child similarly lived a privileged life, as have the children of all presidential candidates dating back for some time. I suspect few if any of those who make the laws for the masses know much at all about the lived experiences of those whom they regulate.
It proves what he really is. Can’t even donate shoes to needy children.. Makes me sick …
“4) The suffering which these and other similarly extremist policies and attitudes will impose on marginalized and already oppressed populations has a high probability of being significantly greater than that which will result from a Clinton presidency.”
“6) However, the left should also recognize that, should Trump win based on its failure to support Clinton, it will repeatedly face the accusation (based in fact), that it lacks concern for those sure to be most victimized by a Trump administration.”
Those children in PS 70 and other poverty stricken neighborhoods around the Nation will bare the brunt of a Trump, Ryan assault . As well as the entire working class.
http://www.alternet.org/election-2016/noam-chomskys-8-point-rationale-voting-lesser-evil-presidential-candidate
make that bear
And you (and Chomsky, as much as I otherwise like him) could be accused of lacking concern for those sure to be most victimized by a Clinton administration. Let’s not pretend that there are any moral options here as if there will be no harm from a second Clinton administration. Well, there was a moral option, but mainstream Dems routed him.
Joel: thanks for the Chomsky article. Glad that someone of his credentials and qualifications is supporting the LEV option. If it already hasn’t happened, he should debate Chris Hedge and or Cornel West. All that being said…………..Supreme Court.
Breyer, Ginsberg, Sotomayor and Kagan are preferable to Alito or Scalia clones any day.
Dienne .
Obama was given a free pass from the left for at least two years and than he put on the populist swing to seek re-election after the Occupy movement changed the narrative. Clinton will be held accountable by the left on day one . If we want the change that the Sanders Revolution promised, it will come through mobilization in the streets of the Nations Capital,State Capitals and Financial Capitals . Putting pressure on Congress and in-turn on Clinton. I have no delusion of the damage neo-liberal democrats in conjunction with their twin brother mainstream neo-liberal Republicans will do .
If you think that the Obama slash Bloomberg… crack down on Occupy was abhorrent, a Trump crack down would look like Kent State with Trump encouraging the fascist firing squads. Similar to what he does against the Black Lives Matter movement. Portraying an America spiraling out of control,in need of an authoritarian leader. Rather than addressing the problems of over policing and out of control police never being held accountable. Sandra Bland guilty of driving while being black. Guilty as charged.
Think of the Justice Department run by Rudy Giuliani replete with broom handles. You are not from NYC if your not familiar, look up Abner Louima
“Giuliani’s first Mayoral campaign began in a police riot, which no-one today remembers. The cops were demonstrating in front of City Hall, then inhabited by a black mayor, David Dinkins. Giuliani stood on the steps and delivered a speech so incendiary that the cops, many of them already drunk, began beating journalists and blocking traffic on the Brooklyn Bridge. It is heavily ironic that Giuliani no longer permits demonstrations on the steps of City Hall.”
http://www.spectacle.org/0300/diallo.html
Hillary Clinton seeks endorsement from Henry Kissinger: https://www.thenation.com/article/hillary-clintons-embrace-of-kissinger-is-inexcusable/?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=New%20Campaign&utm_term=weekly
Dienne
I agree both Clinton and Trump are dangerous on foreign policy. One is unstable, the other a neo-con setting us on a dangerous path with Russia . A path that even Kissinger calls wrongheaded. All the more reason that on day one of a Clinton administration, she has to feel boxed in by peaceful demonstrations the size and frequency not seen since Vietnam. And I think the coalition is there to do it, between environmental, labor,antiwar,black lives matter, Opt out parents, teachers … Time to make “the Tea Party a thing that little girls do.” You might even get some disgruntled “working class white males” to join in.
Joel, HRC is a neo-lib but there might not be much of a difference at last according to this Washington Post Blog Op-Ed.
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2008/11/neocons-and-neoliberals-two-masks-one-face.html
The evidence says that the “neo” movement hijacked both major parties.
neo-libs
neo-cons
neo-nazism
neofacism
Are they all the same?
Lloyd Lofthouse ,
Which is why we defeat Trump and take to the streets, I believe I said the exact same thing as you post.
My words :
” I have no delusion of the damage neo-liberal democrats in conjunction with their twin brother mainstream neo-liberal Republicans will do “.
Your link :
“There is only one party, which simply puts on different faces depending on which “branch” of the party is in power. If its the Democratic branch, there is a slightly liberal social veneer to the mask: a little more funding for social programs, a little more nice guy talk, a little more of a laissez faire attitude towards gays and minorities, and a little more patient push towards military conquest and empire.”
I think we can fight one, the other will set us back 90 years. As you know from our previous discussions. I have never been a Clinton nor Obama fan. They have taken the remnants of the party of Roosevelt and flushed it down the toilet. But I will always be anybody but the Republicans. Trump is just the logical extension of Reagan. Sanders probably could have cut substantially into the Trump vote. Some of those people even voted for Obama in 2008.
“In that sense, he is allied with Peter Cunningham of Education Post, Campbell Brown of The 74, the billionaire Waltons, the billionaire Gates, the billionaire Eli Broad, and every Republican governor.”
and Barack Obama, and Hillary Clinton (not to mention Rahm Emanuel, Cory Booker, Andrew Cuomo, and the list goes on).
See you in the streets of Washington next spring because that is where we will have to be and must be in a Clinton Presidency . I am afraid that that may not be an option in a Trump Presidency.
Trump’s casually insensitive comments demonstrate his true intent. He is willing to stage an event to give “alms to the poor” as long as the cameras are rolling.
Good article: https://www.thenation.com/article/teachers-and-students-occupy-schools-in-shadow-of-olympic-rio/
And Diane gets a mention!
Great article . I subscribe to the Nation and passed it over yesterday. To busy getting sick over the election. Thanks for the post. So guess what, if they can do it in Rio ????
too – oops