Seth Meyers Jokes That a Broke Trump Needs the Presidential Salary

Last updated on July 17th, 2023 at 07:17 pm

There have been many explanations offered for Donald Trump’s refusal to release is tax returns, but Seth Meyers has one that is less ominous than illicit ties with Russia and more pathetic instead: Trump is broke.

According to Meyers, and here he addressed the Republican candidate directly,

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“Trump, I think you’re not releasing your taxes because you don’t have any money. I think you’re broke. I don’t even think you have an accountant. I think you use TurboTax.”

“You’re not running for president because you want the power or you want to make America great, I think you need the $400,000 a year salary.”

Trump benefited from a free ride courtesy of the mainstream media, which saw Trump as a ratings magnet. Fox News reported in late 2015 that,

“There is a general perception that he has all the money he needs,” however, “he’s spending less — he hasn’t had to open his wallet – because of all the attention he’s received,” said Anthony Corrado, professor and campaign finance expert at Colby College in Maine. “His standing in the polls has allowed him to essentially ride this wave of support.”

However, it turned out that free media coverage wasn’t enough. We have seen many indications throughout the campaign that this may be true.

For example, Colin Campbell observed at Business Insider in May that,

Trump frequently brags on the campaign trail that he is self-funding his operation. But after putting in $1.8 million of his own money to jump-start his bid, he gave just over $100,000 to his campaign in the past three months. The bulk of his recent spending came from donations, most of which were relatively small.

Republicans were stunned in May to learn Trump’s campaign was broke. How can this be? The guy is rich! Just ask him.

Still, by mid-June Trump was begging donors for money, and we saw him turn to a telethon – pretty far from financing his own campaign.

Trump highlighted his money woes in mid-July when he whined about Hillary Clinton having money to pay for ads, the implication being that he did not. Then there is the well known fact that he doesn’t pay his debts to contractors, his repeated bankruptcies, and the revelation that the major American banks won’t work with him anymore.

There is nothing far out in Meyer’s joke that Trump is broke. His entire career has been a shell-game and his campaign has offered more of the same. Trump is a deadbeat, trying to pull one over on the American people after having so often doing the same to banks and others he has done business with.

Hrafnkell Haraldsson

Hrafnkell Haraldsson, a social liberal with leanings toward centrist politics has degrees in history and philosophy. His interests include, besides history and philosophy, human rights issues, freedom of choice, religion, and the precarious dichotomy of freedom of speech and intolerance. He brings a slightly different perspective to his writing, being that he is neither a follower of an Abrahamic faith nor an atheist but a polytheist, a modern-day Heathen who follows the customs and traditions of his Norse ancestors. He maintains his own blog, A Heathen’s Day, which deals with Heathen and Pagan matters, and Mos Maiorum Foundation www.mosmaiorum.org, dedicated to ethnic religion. He has also contributed to NewsJunkiePost, GodsOwnParty and Pagan+Politics.