IN NAME ONLY

El Paso Mayor: Trump Called Me a ‘RINO’ in Private Meeting

The mayor says the president took a personal jab at him using the pejorative acronym for “Republican in Name Only.”

El Paso Mayor Dee Margo this week said that President Donald Trump called him a “RINO” in a private meeting during the president’s visit to the Texas city following a mass shooting in which 22 people were murdered.

In an interview with PBS Frontline, Margo recounted how after he told Trump that he is spreading “misinformation” about crime, the president responded by calling him the pejorative term “RINO,” meaning “Republican in Name Only.” Margo recalled: “I said, ‘No, sir. I am not a RINO.’ I said… ‘I simply corrected the misinformation you were given.’”

The president’s misinformation in question was his claim that El Paso, a border town, had one of America’s highest crime rates until a barrier fence was built there. Trump first made the claim during his State of the Union address in February, and Margo corrected him at the time. The president responded by saying Margo was “full of crap.”