Donald Trump’s attorneys have some interesting news: Trump’s ongoing comments (most recently, attempts to discredit a federal judge for being “of Mexican heritage”) have somehow increased business at his hotels and restaurants, according to a claim in the lawyers’ latest salvo against chef José Andrés.
As many will remember, Andrés walked away from plans to run a restaurant in Trump’s new D.C. hotel after Trump said Mexico sends its “rapists” and other undesirables to America. Trump’s attorneys hit Andrés with a $10 million breach-of-contract lawsuit, Andrés countersued for $8 million, and the two are now deadlocked in court. (Trump actually has to quit campaigning for a day later this month so he can testify in the separate lawsuit his attorneys filed against Geoffrey Zakarian.)
Andrés’s team argues that, had the chef gone through with his plans, Trump’s remarks on race would have driven business down by at least 12 percent — bad for a restaurateur’s already-tight margins. In this new filing, however, Trump’s people claim they have analysis from hospitality-industry expert Roger Cline that proves that’s a lie. Cline’s data show that “five of the six Trump-branded hotels in the United States continue to perform well as compared with competitor hotels, and data from the signature restaurants in each of these hotels are performing better in the timeframe after the political statements than they were in the timeframe before the political statements.”
CNN is quick to note their court filing doesn’t bother to actually include Cline’s data, though, so you’ll just have to take their word for it that, just like Trump’s steaks, people can’t get enough of the man’s casual xenophobia.
[CNN]
