Donald Trump, who called for a boycott of Apple, reveals he owns over $1M in company stock
New financial documents disclosed by presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump reveal that the brash billionaire owns a stake in Apple, despite the fact that he called for a boycott of the company over its strong security practices.
Trump has multiple investments in Apple, worth between $1.1 million and $2.25 million, according to the Associated Press. While that's a sizable chunk of change for an average person, the amount remains a drop in the bucket for the businessman-turned-politician, who had an estimated net worth of $4 billion as of last year.
Himself an avid iPhone user, Trump called for a boycott of Apple back in February after the company ended up in a spat with the FBI over encryption. Investigators wanted Apple to create a backdoor in iOS to unlock an iPhone 5c that was tied to last year's San Bernardino massacre, but Apple said doing so would potentially compromise the security of every iPhone on the market.
"First of all Apple should give the security for that phone, okay?" Trump said at a rally in South Carolina earlier this year. "What I think you oughta do is boycott Apple until such time as they give that security number. How do you like... I just thought of that."
At the time, Trump was the Republican frontrunner, but he has since become the party's presumptive nominee, with all other candidates dropping out of the race.
Trump's continued investment in Apple, even after he called for a boycott, shouldn't come as a surprise --?Trump began tweeting from an iPhone once again just three weeks after he suggested his supporters to stop using Apple products.
The real estate mogul's issues with Apple go beyond the encryption issue. On the campaign trail, Trump has also said that if elected president, he plans to make Apple manufacture its products in the U.S. instead of China.
To accomplish that goal, Trump has proposed a 35 percent tax on businesses that make their goods overseas. Apple currently assembles some products, like the Mac Pro, in the U.S., but the bulk of the company's devices, including the iPhone and iPad, are put together overseas.
"We're going to get Apple to build their damn computers in this country instead of other countries," Trump said in January.
For more, read AppleInsider's feature, What Apple would have to do to comply with Donald Trump's American-built mandate.
Trump has multiple investments in Apple, worth between $1.1 million and $2.25 million, according to the Associated Press. While that's a sizable chunk of change for an average person, the amount remains a drop in the bucket for the businessman-turned-politician, who had an estimated net worth of $4 billion as of last year.
Himself an avid iPhone user, Trump called for a boycott of Apple back in February after the company ended up in a spat with the FBI over encryption. Investigators wanted Apple to create a backdoor in iOS to unlock an iPhone 5c that was tied to last year's San Bernardino massacre, but Apple said doing so would potentially compromise the security of every iPhone on the market.
"First of all Apple should give the security for that phone, okay?" Trump said at a rally in South Carolina earlier this year. "What I think you oughta do is boycott Apple until such time as they give that security number. How do you like... I just thought of that."
At the time, Trump was the Republican frontrunner, but he has since become the party's presumptive nominee, with all other candidates dropping out of the race.
Trump's continued investment in Apple, even after he called for a boycott, shouldn't come as a surprise --?Trump began tweeting from an iPhone once again just three weeks after he suggested his supporters to stop using Apple products.
The real estate mogul's issues with Apple go beyond the encryption issue. On the campaign trail, Trump has also said that if elected president, he plans to make Apple manufacture its products in the U.S. instead of China.
To accomplish that goal, Trump has proposed a 35 percent tax on businesses that make their goods overseas. Apple currently assembles some products, like the Mac Pro, in the U.S., but the bulk of the company's devices, including the iPhone and iPad, are put together overseas.
"We're going to get Apple to build their damn computers in this country instead of other countries," Trump said in January.
For more, read AppleInsider's feature, What Apple would have to do to comply with Donald Trump's American-built mandate.
Comments
Pathological liar.
Go figure.
so he's spending all that money for something he doesn't want? Really?
He has such strong support among a seemingly ever-increasing number of people (if the polls are to be believed) who don't care what he does or says. They're going to support him no matter what. Remember when he said that if he shot someone in broad daylight on the street in Manhattan, his fans would still support him? Seemed like stupid immature bravado at the time, but he was right. It doesn't matter that he won't release his taxes (or if he does, that they'll show that he either isn't as rich as he says or that he didn't pay much or that he didn't really contribute to charity), that he's treated women badly, that he seems to have the hots for his own daughter, that he doesn't know anything about policy, that he's had a ton of business failures and has walked away from debt, that he's suggested that he'd use nuclear weapons in Europe, that he keeps reversing his positions and that he's already backing away from his previous positions by saying, "no one's doing anything - it's just a proposal". They love his big mouth and they confuse that big immature vulgar mouth with honesty. Every insane thing that he's done or said has worked for him. I still think this was originally intended as a branding exercise and that he was trying to lose, but it backfired.
For a long time I thought there was no way he could win. The Democrats would have 232 electoral votes without the tossup states (FL (29), OH (18), VA(13), WI(10), CO(9), IA(6), NV(6), NM(5), NH(4)) so they just need 38 more. If they won Florida they'd have 261 and they'd just need 9 from the remaining 8 tossup states with 71 electoral votes - almost impossible to lose -- Obama won every one of those states. But if Trump wins Florida (even though Obama didn't need Florida to win the last election) and Pennsylvania, which is looking like a real possibility, Hillary would need 58 of the remaining 71 tossup state electoral votes (or 52 if Utah turns Democratic).
And if the Bernie supporters act out at the Democratic Convention, it's going to be 1968 all over again. It doesn't matter if they're right. What matters is that as in 1968, the riots at the convention (even though it was the Daley's Chicago police who rioted) made the country think that's what Democrats would bring to the country if they won. That's how we got Nixon.
I think Hillary is going to do very badly against him in debates. You can't debate someone who only makes statements that are vague generalities. Hillary will say something specific about policy and Trump will reply with the equivalent of "Yo mama is ugly and everyone in Washington is a fool and Benghazi is your fault". And he'll win.
It could really happen. We might be electing a President who makes George W. Bush look like a brilliant statesman. But If Trump does get elected, my guess is that he gets impeached before the four years are out because he'll be hated by both sides of the aisle. I wonder if he realizes that he's got to put all his businesses in a trust while he's POTUS.