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Familiar Talk on Women, From an Unfamiliar Trump
The New York Times
Jason Horowitz
8/18/2015
Excerpt:
The outspoken scion of the New York real estate developer Fred C. Trump stood on stage in Washington one day in 1992 and told a mostly female crowd of law enforcement agents to lighten up when it came to sexual harassment.
“Professional hypochondriacs,” the speaker said, were making it hard for “men to be themselves” and were turning “every sexy joke of long ago, every flirtation,” into “sexual harassment,” thus ruining “any kind of playfulness and banter. Where has the laughter gone?” As for boorish behavior, the best way to disarm it was with “humor and gentle sarcasm,” or better yet, that “potent weapon” of a “feminine exterior and a will of steel.”
The aversion to political correctness and the dispensing of unorthodox advice were straight from the playbook of Donald J. Trump, the Republican presidential candidate who has made a business, and now the beginnings of a political career, out of over-the-top oratory. But these particular Trumpisms came instead from his older sister, Maryanne Trump Barry.
A senior judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit who was appointed to the bench by Ronald Reagan and promoted by Bill Clinton, Ms. Barry, 78, would perhaps be the ideal person to argue in her brother’s defense as he faces familiar accusations of misogyny, if she would speak publicly.
Instead, Mr. Trump spoke for her, saying he had sought Ms. Barry’s counsel after the Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly asked him, in a widely watched debate, about his past remarks on women (“You’ve called women you don’t like ‘fat pigs,’ ‘dogs,’ ‘slobs’ and ‘disgusting animals’ ”). He was widely criticized for insinuating the next day that Ms. Kelly had been menstruating at the time. Mr. Trump denied that he had meant that.
His sister, he said in an interview, was supportive.
“She called me to say she’s very proud,” Mr. Trump said. “She said, ‘Just be yourself.’ Of course, I don’t know if that’s good advice, but she said, ‘Just be yourself and you do well, really well.’ ”
He added that Ms. Barry had a view of gender equality not unlike his own. “My sister has a very unique view on this, and — not so unique,” he said. “She feels that women are very smart and can be very tough and can be at least equal to men, and that women can fight very hard.”
Ms. Barry — whose husband, John J. Barry, was a politically connected New Jersey lawyer who counted Mr. Trump as one of his clients — now lives in a Fifth Avenue apartment in Manhattan overlooking Central Park. She declined to comment for this article.
“I have a sister who just doesn’t want to talk to reporters. Can you believe it?” Mr. Trump said, explaining that he had called his sister and suggested that she speak with an inquiring reporter. “I said: ‘Maybe they mixed us at birth. Maybe one of us got mixed up a little bit. Who knows.’ ”
People close to Ms. Barry say she is decidedly not the mixed-up one in the family.
Although she did not start law school until after her son was in sixth grade, Ms. Barry has had a four-decade career as a prosecutor and federal judge, achieving a measure of celebrity independent of her brother. (“This is not the Trump Princess,” The Chicago Sun-Times wrote in 1989.) Some friends say they did not even know she was part of the famous family.
“There was a story in Time magazine or something, and a couple of the other lawyers come in and go, ‘Did you know Maryanne is a Trump?’ ” said Donald J. Volkert Jr., a former New Jersey Superior Court judge who became a close friend of Ms. Barry’s. “And I said, ‘What’s a trump?’ ”
Ms. Barry earned a reputation as a tough judge with a strong command of her courtroom. In 1989, as a district court judge in Essex County, N.J., she blocked a plea deal that would have freed two county detectives accused of protecting a drug dealer. She forced the case to trial, where the detectives were convicted and received 12- and 15-year jail terms. She presided over the conviction of Louis (Bobby) Manna, the Genovese crime family boss accused of trying to assassinate a rival, John Gotti. And in 1996, she chastised federal prosecutors for trying to deport a former deputy attorney general of Mexico, calling their efforts politically motivated, unconstitutional and “Kafkaesque.”
.................................................
View the complete article, including image, at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/19/us...ster.html?_r=0
The New York Times
Jason Horowitz
8/18/2015
Excerpt:
The outspoken scion of the New York real estate developer Fred C. Trump stood on stage in Washington one day in 1992 and told a mostly female crowd of law enforcement agents to lighten up when it came to sexual harassment.
“Professional hypochondriacs,” the speaker said, were making it hard for “men to be themselves” and were turning “every sexy joke of long ago, every flirtation,” into “sexual harassment,” thus ruining “any kind of playfulness and banter. Where has the laughter gone?” As for boorish behavior, the best way to disarm it was with “humor and gentle sarcasm,” or better yet, that “potent weapon” of a “feminine exterior and a will of steel.”
The aversion to political correctness and the dispensing of unorthodox advice were straight from the playbook of Donald J. Trump, the Republican presidential candidate who has made a business, and now the beginnings of a political career, out of over-the-top oratory. But these particular Trumpisms came instead from his older sister, Maryanne Trump Barry.
A senior judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit who was appointed to the bench by Ronald Reagan and promoted by Bill Clinton, Ms. Barry, 78, would perhaps be the ideal person to argue in her brother’s defense as he faces familiar accusations of misogyny, if she would speak publicly.
Instead, Mr. Trump spoke for her, saying he had sought Ms. Barry’s counsel after the Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly asked him, in a widely watched debate, about his past remarks on women (“You’ve called women you don’t like ‘fat pigs,’ ‘dogs,’ ‘slobs’ and ‘disgusting animals’ ”). He was widely criticized for insinuating the next day that Ms. Kelly had been menstruating at the time. Mr. Trump denied that he had meant that.
His sister, he said in an interview, was supportive.
“She called me to say she’s very proud,” Mr. Trump said. “She said, ‘Just be yourself.’ Of course, I don’t know if that’s good advice, but she said, ‘Just be yourself and you do well, really well.’ ”
He added that Ms. Barry had a view of gender equality not unlike his own. “My sister has a very unique view on this, and — not so unique,” he said. “She feels that women are very smart and can be very tough and can be at least equal to men, and that women can fight very hard.”
Ms. Barry — whose husband, John J. Barry, was a politically connected New Jersey lawyer who counted Mr. Trump as one of his clients — now lives in a Fifth Avenue apartment in Manhattan overlooking Central Park. She declined to comment for this article.
“I have a sister who just doesn’t want to talk to reporters. Can you believe it?” Mr. Trump said, explaining that he had called his sister and suggested that she speak with an inquiring reporter. “I said: ‘Maybe they mixed us at birth. Maybe one of us got mixed up a little bit. Who knows.’ ”
People close to Ms. Barry say she is decidedly not the mixed-up one in the family.
Although she did not start law school until after her son was in sixth grade, Ms. Barry has had a four-decade career as a prosecutor and federal judge, achieving a measure of celebrity independent of her brother. (“This is not the Trump Princess,” The Chicago Sun-Times wrote in 1989.) Some friends say they did not even know she was part of the famous family.
“There was a story in Time magazine or something, and a couple of the other lawyers come in and go, ‘Did you know Maryanne is a Trump?’ ” said Donald J. Volkert Jr., a former New Jersey Superior Court judge who became a close friend of Ms. Barry’s. “And I said, ‘What’s a trump?’ ”
Ms. Barry earned a reputation as a tough judge with a strong command of her courtroom. In 1989, as a district court judge in Essex County, N.J., she blocked a plea deal that would have freed two county detectives accused of protecting a drug dealer. She forced the case to trial, where the detectives were convicted and received 12- and 15-year jail terms. She presided over the conviction of Louis (Bobby) Manna, the Genovese crime family boss accused of trying to assassinate a rival, John Gotti. And in 1996, she chastised federal prosecutors for trying to deport a former deputy attorney general of Mexico, calling their efforts politically motivated, unconstitutional and “Kafkaesque.”
.................................................
View the complete article, including image, at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/19/us...ster.html?_r=0