Courting the youth vote, former President Donald Trump welcomed Adin Ross – a popular streamer that his son Barron watches – to his Mar-a-Lago resort for a wide-ranging interview, scoring a personalized Tesla Cybertruck from the 23-year-old influencer.
During the interview, the 45th president revealed that his 18-year-old son is a fan of Ross, who is known online for streaming video games and is an enthusiastic backer of Trump.
“My son Barron says hello. He’s a great young guy but he’s a big fan of yours,” Trump said during the interview, before riffing about how smart and tall his youngest son is.
5
Ross later gifted Trump the MAGA-adorned car emblazoned on its passenger side door with an image of the former president defiantly pumping his fist in the air after narrowly surviving an assassination attempt on July 13.
“That’s an Elon [Musk]. Wow. That is beautiful,” Trump quipped as he walked outside to see the somewhat bulletproof electric truck decorated with an American flag, the “Make America Great Again” slogan, and the assassination photo.
“I think it’s incredible,” Trump added.
It comes as the Trump campaign pushes to shore up more support with younger voters. Some polls had shown Trump gaining ground with younger men, in particular, prior to President Biden’s abrupt withdrawal from the race last month.
In the interview geared toward younger audiences, Trump declared that he was “going to save TikTok” and urged users of the popular short-form video-sharing platform to vote for him – despite pushing for the social media company’s ban during his presidency.
5
Earlier this year, Congress passed a law that would require TikTok’s parent company ByteDance to sell off the platform or be banned from the Google and Apple app stores due to concerns about its links to the Chinese Communist Party.
Biden, 81, signed the bill into law after a majority of Republicans had backed it in Congress.
When touring the Cybertruck, both Ross and Trump got in the vehicle and started cranking some tunes on the former president’s personal playlist. This included songs from the Beach Boys, Elvis Presley, Michael Jackson, and the YMCA song.
On the campaign stump, Trump has remarked about electric vehicles and taken aim at the Biden administration, accusing Democrats of pushing EVs too aggressively.
5
Still, particularly after Tesla CEO Musk’s endorsem*nt of him, Trump has stressed that he’s not against EVs.
“I’m for electric cars. I have to be because Elon Musk endorsed me, so I have no choice. I’m for them, but for a small slice,” he said during an Atlanta rally last week.
“They want to go all-electric and there’s no way you can ever load [charge] them up,” he added, before knocking the administration’s subsidies for EV charging stations.
5
Trump touched on a range of topics during his sit-down with Ross, suggesting that Iran was going to attack Israel overnight, noting conspiracy theories about Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau being the offspring of Cuban dictator Fidel Castro, and more.
At one point, Ross asked Trump for his thoughts on Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, prompting him to call her “fake.”
“But she knows it, she’s got a thing going. It’s a good thing — It’s a good thing for her. But there’s a certain something she’s got. She’s got a good spark, it’s pretty amazing, actually,” Trump said.
Trump claimed that he asked allies of former Rep. Joe Crowley (D-NY) if they were being “careful” during Ocasio-Cortez’s rise in 2018. She ultimately went on to defeat him in a stunning upset that blue wave year.
5
“I called her Evita, maybe that’s the best — Evita Perone,” he explained, referring to the former first lady of Argentina. It was previously reported that Trump compared Ocasio-Cortez to Peron.
“She’s in the streets screaming, shouting, going crazy, hugging people,” Trump continued. “I said, ‘He better be careful.’ And she took him out. So I give her credit.”
Throughout the sit down, Trump took swipes at Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris.
“She’s gotta save the country, but it’s not gonna happen,” he remarked near the end of the stream with Ross.
He mused that most of the top names he was hearing about during Harris’ veepstakes were stronger picks than she is.
“All of the people she’s looking at are much better than her,” he jabbed. “I think virtually every one of them is considered better, smatter, would be a better president than her.”
Last week, Trump’s running mate Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio) sat down for an interview on the “Full Send” podcast as the campaign seeks to further solidify any gains with male voters.
