Josh Milton
Published December 1, 2025 8:09am
Updated December 1, 2025 8:22am
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Previous Page Next PageUS President Donald Trump has said he stands by calling Democratic governor Tim Walz ‘seriously r******d’.
Trump wrote on his social media platform, Truth Social, that the Minnesota leader ‘does nothing’ about ‘Somalian gangs’.
He used the r-word, widely considered a slur – when describing the governor.
The president stood by his use of the slur yesterday evening, telling a reporter: ‘Yeah, I think there’s something wrong with him, absolutely, for sure.’
Donald Trump has used the r-word before (Picture: Getty Images North America)
Trump asked the journalist aboard Air Force One if she ‘has a problem’ with his remark.
‘You know what,’ he said, before giving the reporter time to respond, ‘I think there’s something wrong with him.
‘Anyone who would do what he did, anyone who would allow those people into a state and pay billions of dollars out to Somalia. We give billions of dollars to Somalia – it’s not even a country because it doesn’t function like a country.
‘It’s got a name but it doesn’t function like a country.’
The exchange was uploaded to the official White House YouTube channel.
Somalia is a country, being listed as such by various governments, encyclopedias, the United Nations and world maps hung in American schools.
The US president said Somalia is not a country (Picture: Getty Images)
Trump was criticised for using the derogatory word last week.
Walz said the world has spent three decades to ‘get this out of our schools.
He added to NBC’s Kristen Welker: ‘Kids know better than to use it. But look, this is what Donald Trump has done.
‘He’s normalised this type of hateful behaviour and this type of language.’
Senator Michael Bohacek, who has a daughter with Down syndrome, said he wouldn’t support an effort in his state to redraw congressional district lines that favour Republicans because of it.
‘This is not the first time our president has used these insulting and derogatory references and his choices of words have consequences,’ he said.
Trump has used the r-word on several occasions, including in audio leaks about comments he made about then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions.
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Previous Page Next PageHe also said ‘mentally r******’ during a 2004 appearance on The Howard Stern Show when discussing a conversation he had with an unnamed ‘golf pro’.
Trump has increasingly scuffed with reporters, including telling a reporter grilling him about the Jeffrey Epstein files: ‘Quiet, piggy.’
And this wasn’t the first time – in 2020, Trump told a female journalist to ‘keep her voice down’ during a White House briefing.
The r-word, while a medical label for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities, is sometimes used as a jab akin to ‘idiot’.
The phrase is ‘inappropriate because it is an inaccurate overgeneralisation’, according to The ‘r’ Word Campaign.
‘The r-word is also now inappropriate because of its negative connotation and its history of being used to demean and abuse people,’ the group said.
It adds: ‘Please do not use the r-word anymore to describe someone whose brain works differently. Please emphasise our personhood when communicating about us.’
Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at [email protected].
For more stories like this, check our news page.
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