Meet the Trump adviser who was once among Clinton’s most emphatic fans
SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE / TRIBUNE NEWS SERVICE
Peter Navarro, an economic advisor to Donald Trump, once described this 1996 event where Hillary Clinton campaigned for his failed congressional run as “heavenly.”
WASHINGTON » The colorful California academic who helped inspire Donald Trump’s rants against free trade deals has had an interesting life full of interesting experiences that he details in his many books.
But one really stands out — so much so that Peter Navarro, an outspoken member of Trump’s economic advisory team, called it “sweet manna from heaven.”
It was the day Hillary Clinton came to San Diego to give his run for Congress a boost.
Clinton, of course, is now one of Navarro’s favorite villains. Navarro, a University of California, Irvine professor, rarely misses an opportunity to tear down her resume. His polished critiques of Clinton are one of the more potent weapons of the Trump campaign, which has struggled to attract credentialed economic thinkers. Navarro can often be found on cable news, on the radio and in the pages of major newspapers warning about how a Clinton administration would lead to more misery for a shrinking middle class.
But he had a different view of Clinton during his unsuccessful run for Congress in San Diego in 1996. Navarro was a Democrat then, and had then written quite extensively about the virtues of the free trade deals he now reviles. In his 1998 tell-all memoir “San Diego Confidential,” Navarro details his encounter with Clinton alongside a large picture of the two standing together with wide grins.
“I don’t know why so many people in America hate Hillary Clinton,” Navarro wrote. “I found her to be one of the most gracious, intelligent, perceptive, and, yes, classy women I have ever met.” He wrote admiringly of how Clinton lured 3,000 people to come to his rally the Saturday before Election Day, and stirred up an enthusiasm he had not previously experienced.
“Walking up to the podium before the cheering crowd, I felt like the pope in Buenos Aires, Larry Bird in the Boston Garden, and Billy Graham in Oklahoma all rolled into one. What a thrill it is to give a speech to a crowd that roars with approval at your every utterance!”
Reached by phone, Navarro said he was simply among the many in the 1990s who were seduced by the charm and power of the Clintons. “I did not know at the time that Bill and Hillary Clinton had already begun what would become the Clinton Foundation corruption scheme even as I was standing there with Hillary that night,” Navarro said. “It’s fair to say my encounters with the Clintons were the same kind of seduction they have been getting away with for years. … I didn’t have the awareness I probably should have.”
Navarro said his “evolution” to judging the Clintons to be “two of the most corrupt political figures in American history” came only years later, as he focused his research on the trade deals they pursued, their effect on the economy, and the donations from foreign leaders that flowed to their foundation. He now accuses them of running “an arrogant scam” that is “Bernie Madoff-esque.”
Now, Navarro may cringe when looking back at what he wrote in 1998. In one passage of the book, he reminisced fondly about the photo of his event with Clinton that ran prominently in the San Diego Union-Tribune. “Hillary and I stand together applauding the crowd, exuding an almost cherubic warmth that, frankly, tends to elude us both,” it said.
Navarro also expressed wonderment then for how Clinton deftly worked donors, charming 10 of them who each paid a thousand dollars to have their photo taken with the then first lady before a background of black velvet and American flags. “I came in in the middle of the flashbulbs going off and just lay back and let Hillary do her thing with my donors,” Navarro wrote.
In this strange election cycle, these sorts of past affiliations are not particularly unusual. Trump himself had Clinton as a guest to his wedding. On his syndicated radio show in 2008, Trump said of Clinton: “I know her and she’d make a good president or good vice president.”
Now he smiles as crowds at Trump rallies chant, “Lock her up.” Navarro calls Clinton “almost like the sociopath who does not know right from wrong.”
The economist was more forgiving two decades ago when he pondered whether Clinton inadvertently helped incumbent GOP Rep. Brian Bilbray beat him by more than 21,000 votes. Navarro recalled in his memoir how one of his advisers saw the photo in the Union-Tribune and thought, “Wow, the only thing better than this would have been a shot of Navarro arm-in-arm with Jesse Jackson or Fidel Castro.”
But the economist also said then he had no regrets, writing, “The Hillary rally was a heavenly experience.”
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©2016 Tribune Co.
36 responses to “Meet the Trump adviser who was once among Clinton’s most emphatic fans”
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Another pointless non-story. Where’s Waldo?
Let me liven this a bit although off topix. Obama defends Colin Kapernick. OMG! Sticking his nose in where it’s not needed. SAD
Racists usually do what O did.
When they’re not doing what you did.
Exposing O as a racist? You didn’t know that!
Has anyone ever notice how attractive Ms. Clinton looks in the past? She was very attractive then . She has aged not as gracefully as one would imagined. Are pictures of her past and present are metaphors of her youthful innocence then vs her woman of the world “go for broke” experiences and conniving ways of today?
Wizard, you may be onto something. Had Hillary been a traditional cookie baking stay at home mom instead of a power hungry opportunist she may have hung on to her looks (and figure) a little longer. Alas, we’ll never know.
Grow up!
The Donald is going to expose what’s under those pajamas at the debates.
Dawg …you make like a pooch…you talkin from experience?
Agree and add in Health issues and it does show. Look during her SoS and now…not good.
You eating to much koolaid laced rawhide bow wow
Everyone looks best when they’re young. Doesn’t take a sixth grader to figure that one out.
I imagine you, yourself, are less Moa and more Mo’o now.
I guess money talks and $$$$$ can make a lot of people flip flop.
Yup Clinton Cash.
Only in America could politicians talk about the greed of the rich at a $35,000-a-plate campaign fund-raising event. Hill is selling her potential influence to her wealthy supporters.
” . . . he focused his research on the trade deals they pursued, their effect on the economy, and the donations from foreign leaders that flowed to their foundation. He now accuses them of running “an arrogant scam” that is “Bernie Madoff-esque.”
the money laundering foundation founded by epstein, the white slaver, and the female felon will be exposed as the criminal operation it is even as more nations and criminals continue to bribe their way into international influence.
chelsea is well schooled in handling laundered money as both her father and father-in-law were indicted, arrested, convicted and sentenced to prison for fraud.
Too much money invested in 30 years of corruption. We’ve heard about his bankruptcies, ex wives, Mexican judge, he’s racist, sexist, stiffs sub contractors, Putin, . Nothing compared to what Crooked Hilliary did.
You want America to become In Allah We Trust? Maybe so if you want to beat your wife and get away with it.
Sounds you be talkin bout yoself bro. btw…Hon Marathon coming up…you signed up chubs? Join me.
How come the AP hasn’t reported on any of Clinton’s advisors. Her top 2 advisors have enough dirt between them to occupy an army of investigative journalists. Cheryl Mills was instrumental in the e-mail coverup. Human Abedin has questionable ties to terror organizations no to mention a husband who was separated from Bill Clinton at birth. But not a peep from the progressive media about any of this. Dishonest and corrupt media and central government.
U R CRAIZEYEYEYEY!
You’re uninformed.
You ‘drink to much kool-aid’ and it is not good for your health. It is just TRUMP-SUGA!
Dawgyou sound like a meow
Fox News was played and reported a lie: “Recently released FBI notes pertaining to the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server reveal that Fox News’ interview and subsequent hyping of claims made by imprisoned Romanian hacker Marcel Lehel Lazar were all based on a lie. The FBI report states that “analysis” showed no “evidence that Lazar hacked the server,” and also notes that Lazar “admitted to lying to FOX News.” Fox’s willingness to report an imprisoned hacker’s claims as fact doesn’t represent the first time the network has been burned by sources in an attempt to scandalize Clinton’s use of a private email server.” – Media Matters
Who cares? It doesn’t change the fact that Hillary Clinton used a private server to store government email containing classified information! And the FBI let her walk, despite her crimes.
The most heinous violations were exposed NOT by some “random hacker” but by Clinton’s PERSONAL ADVISOR Huma Abedin during U.S. Congressional hearings on the matter. Wake up!
That’s how he repays his friends. So much for loyalty, regardless of political affiliation.
Navarro has turned into a desperate ‘kook.’
An apt portrayal of the Clinton family, ” almost like a sociopath”, as indicated in the 3rd to the last paragraph. Not my words but by a former supporter of the Clintons. Wow a bomb shell!
Why would I want to “meet” a person second only to Drumpf in his shameless self-promotion?
I pity his students, who get only the gristly scraps of his time and effort.
Why you so sensitive? Is it “Defending the Indefensible”? Why aren’t you espousing O’s years & hiLIARy’s proposed continuation of O’s policies? Oh & btw…what major positive accomplishments has either of your leaders done? O has none so far & recently China just made a fool of him.
Both candidates are sociopaths. One hides it better.
We found Waldo. The old mare had a rough time in Cleveland, the coughing fit she had did not sound good. Her running mate looked like he wanted to slide under his chair. I do not wish any ill will toward Bill’s wife but I think the stress of 3 decades of lies may be finally catching up to her. Surely this is a bigger story than a Trump advisor supporting Hillary in his misguided youth.
She does have Health issues that needs to be opened for viewing to Americans. Americans have a fight to know.
This guy is another guy deserting Republicans an American business on trade and joining Sandrs and Trump and labor unions to block trade agreements at the cost of business to try to save obsolete American jobs. unions with declining membership. Trade and operations around the world are very good for American businesses but they have not shared it with workers. Do not stop trade. Just make businesses share the benefits of trade with American workers and provide relocation and training for new jobs.
That is the most absurd thing I have ever heard! I don’t want to be “trained” and “relocated” to China for new job. I want to live and work HERE!
Wake up, tempmanoa. No wonder Trump is winning.