Lifestyle

That Child Care Trump Brags About His Companies Having? It’s For Guests, Not Employees

by Mike Julianelle
Updated: 
Originally Published: 
Image via Jeff Swensen/Getty Images

Donald Trump claimed he offered his employees free childcare, but that’s not actually the case

Guys, I have some shocking news: Donald Trump lied about something. I know, I know, it’s crazy. But before we jump to any conclusions, let’s make sure we have all the information.

According to the Associated Press’s Big Story, when Trump talked up his employee’s access to on-site childcare centers during a candidate Q&A in Iowa last November, he wasn’t getting the details right.

“You know, it’s not expensive for a company to do it. You need one person or two people, and you need some blocks, and you need some swings and some toys,” Trump said. “It’s not an expensive thing, and I do it all over. And I get great people because of it. Because it’s a problem with a lot of other companies.”

You heard him, he does it all over. Many people are saying so! Except the AP did a little digging, and discovered that the two big childcare programs, Trump Kids and Trumpeteers (because Trump has never found a thing that couldn’t be improved by the addition of his name), are actually for guests and customers who visit clubs and hotels.

“Trump Kids” is described on the Trump Hotel Collection website as ‘a special travel program designed to help make your next family vacation a big hit.’ Its offerings include “kid-friendly amenities like kiddie cocktails, coloring books and no-tear bath amenities.”

Um, this isn’t a matter of getting the details wrong. Claiming to provide free child care to your thousands of employees but actually only offering it to paid customers is kind of a big difference.

“No, there’s no child care,” said Trump International Hotel housekeeper Maria Jaramillo. She should know, she has four kids and has worked at the Las Vegas hotel for almost eight years. “It would make it much more easy to take our kids to day care at work,” she said. When someone told her what Trump had said in Iowa, she laughed. “If they have child care, at least they should tell us.”

It is funny. At least, it would be, if this weren’t part of a pattern, and if Trump weren’t a vote away from being the president of the United States. At this point it’s pretty clear that Mr. Trump doesn’t care about his employees or their families, or your families, or anyone but himself. He just talks and talks, seemingly not at all worried about the truth behind his words, nor about the eventual backlash that comes when he’s proven wrong. It’s happened on a near daily basis throughout this campaign.

Again, this would be funny, if it mattered. But for people who are supporting this racist, misogynistic, xenophobic narcissist, it doesn’t. If Trump’s thinly veiled request for his supporters to assassinate Hillary Clinton should she seek to appoint Supreme Court justices who will challenge their right to own guns didn’t cause them to jump ship, a little lie about how great his nonexistent employee childcare program is will hardly change their minds.

Hopefully, it matters enough to the rest of us so we head to the polls in November and make sure this dangerous blowhard doesn’t have control of the country’s childcare policy.

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