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Back when Joe Biden was the expected Democratic nominee, Donald Trump was constantly claiming that Biden was old and demented. How things change. Now the shoe is on the other foot. Last Thursday, Trump told reporters at Mar-a-Lago that sometime in the 1990s, he was in a helicopter with former San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown and the copter was forced to have an emergency landing somewhere in California. Why Trump even told this story is not clear, except he knows that back when Kamala Harris was single, she briefly dated Brown.
It didn't take long for Brown to speak up and completely rebut the story. He said that he was never in a helicopter with Trump. Brown said: "Never happened, period. And I think my memory is probably better than his." All Trump's campaign had to say in response is: "Slick Willie." That was formerly a reference to Bill Clinton and has nothing to do with Brown.
Next up, Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA) said: "I was once in a helicopter with Trump and former California governor Jerry Brown in 2018 inspecting wildfires and it most certainly did not go down, although Trump did talk about the possibility. Newsom said that Trump is confusing Willie Brown (who is Black) and Jerry Brown (who is white).
After that came out, former California state senator Nate Holden gave an interview in which he said HE was the one in the helicopter with Trump in 1990 and he remembers the near-death experience very well. He added: "Willie is a short Black guy who lives in San Francisco and I am a tall Black guy who lives in Los Angeles. I guess we all look alike." Holden said that he was in the helicopter with Trump because Trump wanted to build something on the site of the historic Ambassador Hotel and the site was in Holden's state Senate district so Trump wanted his support for the project. Holden further said that Trump Organization executive VP Barbara Res was also in the helicopter. On Friday, Res told Politico that she also remembered the incident and even wrote about it in her memoir. She confirmed that the Black man on the helicopter was definitely Nate Holden.
Oh, one more thing. The incident occurred on a trip from New York City to Atlantic City, NJ, to show Holden how magnificent one of Trump's casinos was. Holden recalled that Trump was extremely miffed when they were leaving Trump Tower because several people recognized Holden and addressed him as "senator," while no one recognized Trump.
With so many witnesses now, there is no doubt that the Brown-Holden-Res story is the true one. Trump was never in a helicopter with Willie Brown (but he was with Jerry Brown in California). Trump was also in one with Holden and Res and it almost crashed (in New Jersey). What's going on here? Option 1: Trump is lying. Option 2: Trump is old, his memory is failing, and he can't tell a short Black man from a tall Black man and can't even tell a white man named Brown from a Black man named Brown. Holden is 17 years older than Trump, yet the near-crash was so scary, even 34 years later he remembers it very clearly. While Biden was in the race, there was a lot of talk about whether he had dementia. Now the subject is changing to whether Trump has dementia, and stories like this one don't help him. (V)