Donald Trump has been talking about the need for toughness on the campaign trail and touted his support from former heavyweight champion Mike Tyson.
“You know, all the tough guys endorse me. I like that, OK,” said Trump about Tyson.
Well, Carly Fiorina didn’t sit still for this yesterday, given that Tyson is a convicted rapist (via Politico):
Fiorina, standing beside Cruz as the two took questions from the media in Indianapolis, said she was “interested to see” the endorsement and blasted the real-estate mogul for calling Tyson "tough," referring to when the boxer was convicted of rape in the 1990s, in Indiana, no less.“Sorry, I don't consider a convicted rapist a tough guy,” Fiorina told reporters. “And I think it says a lot about Donald Trump's campaign and his character that he is standing up and cheering for an endorsement by Mike Tyson.”
Tyson spent three years in prison after he was convicted of raping a beauty pageant contestant in Indiana in 1992.
“But Mike said: ‘I love Trump. I endorse Trump,'" Trump said Wednesday. “And that's the end. I'm sure he doesn't know about your economic situation in Indiana. But when I get endorsed by the tough ones, I like it, because you know what? We need toughness now. We need toughness.”
Apparently, Roger Stone, a Trump supporter, thought that Fiorina’s remarks are somehow racist.
I knew @CarlyFiorina was an incompetent. I didn't know she was a racist .https://t.co/8O6Py6EOxf #Trump2016
— Roger Stone (@RogerJStoneJr) April 29, 2016
Over a RedState, Strieff provided previous tweets from Stone that were racially charged, while Larry O’Connor at Hot Air noted, “Hoosier don’t forget,” alluding to the fact that Trump touted Tyson at an Indianapolis rally, where Tyson committed his vicious act. O’Connor also included radio host Greg Garrison’s opening monologue from his Thursday broadcast since he was the man who prosecuted Tyson back in the 1990s. He knows something about this incident.
“This was not Trump’s proudest moment and his affiliation with Tyson is hardly something to brag about. So maybe he should stop bragging about it,” O’ Connor wrote.
Trump had said that Tyson was wrongfully convicted of the charge (via Newsbusters):
It’s my opinion that, to a large extent, Mike Tyson was railroaded in this case… You have a young woman that was in his room, in his hotel late in the evening at her own will. You have a young woman who was seen dancing for the beauty contest, dancing with a big smile on her face. Looked happy as can be.
Roger Stone also thinks that Tyson was wrongfully convicted.
Irrational losers at @Redstate ramp up the childish name calling- yes I think Tyson was wrongly convicted https://t.co/Bi9zXKIpAM
— Roger Stone (@RogerJStoneJr) April 30, 2016
Still, I don’t see how this is racist. What Fiorina said was factual—Tyson is a convicted rapist. You can disagree concerning whether the conviction was just or not, but there’s no legitimate reference to race in that view. That debate about whether convictions are just or unjust speaks more about the conduct of those in our justice system. It’s a bizarre line of attack, as there is not a scintilla of race in Fiorina’s remarks, or the Tyson rape case itself; the victim was black. So, I guess we’ll just have to file this one with the other nonsensical incidents derived from Trump and his crew this election cycle.