(Panama Digest) Panama City’s municipal council has declared Donald Trump persona non grata after the real estate tycoon said that the United States was stupid for giving the Canal back to Panama in exchange for nothing.
“We unanimously approved a resolution that declared Donald Trump persona non grata,” Javier Ortega, a member of the council, told AFP Friday.
President Ricardo Martinelli qualified Trump’s statements as “lamentable, unfortunate and inappropriate.”
Former Foreign Minister of Canal Affairs, Jorge Ritter, said that he was surprised that “a man like Trump could display an ignorance as large as the size of his fortune. ”
Minister of Commerce Roberto Henriquez said that the comments were political nonsense from someone who is investing millions in Panama.
Trump’s comments appear to date back to a CNN Situation room interview aired on September 22, 2010, which seems to indicate that it took Panama almost six months to declare Trump unwelcome, just a little under four months before the inauguration of the Trump Ocean Club Tower in Panama City.
Donald Trump