Trump: Gary Cohn’s A ‘Globalist,’ But I Still Like Him
President Trump took a moment during Thursday’s cabinet meeting to bid farewell to his departing economic adviser Gary Cohn, but did so using language sometimes accused of having anti-Semitic characteristics.
“He’s been terrific,” Trump said of Cohn, who is Jewish. “He may be a globalist, but I still like him. He’s seriously globalist, there’s no question, but you know what, in his own way he’s also a nationalist because he loves our country.”
According to The New York Times, the term “globalist” is used in extreme right-wing circles with “distinct xenophobic, anti-immigrant and anti-Semitic overtones” and refers to “a conspiratorial worldview: a cabal that likes open borders, diversity and weak nation states, and that dislikes white people, Christianity and the traditional culture of their own country.”
Trump frequently uses the term to refer to people like Cohn who hold an economic philosophy that favors free trade and open markets. When he described Cohn as a globalist Trump drew a smiles from cabinet members around the table, including Cohn himself who was sitting behind the president.
White House budget director Mick Mulvaney also tried to use the term in a playful way on Tuesday, tweeting: “As a right-wing conservative…I never expected the coworker I would work closest and best with would be a ‘globalist.’”
In the past, the term “globalist” was used by ‘alt-right’ activists to attack Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, who is also Jewish.
Contact Nathan Guttman at [email protected] or on Twitter @nathanguttman
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning journalism this Passover.
In this age of misinformation, our work is needed like never before. We report on the news that matters most to American Jews, driven by truth, not ideology.
At a time when newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall. That means for the first time in our 126-year history, Forward journalism is free to everyone, everywhere. With an ongoing war, rising antisemitism, and a flood of disinformation that may affect the upcoming election, we believe that free and open access to Jewish journalism is imperative.
Readers like you make it all possible. Right now, we’re in the middle of our Passover Pledge Drive and we still need 300 people to step up and make a gift to sustain our trustworthy, independent journalism.
Make a gift of any size and become a Forward member today. You’ll support our mission to tell the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
Only 300 more gifts needed by April 30