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Yang Brags He Can Beat 73-Year-Old Trump in Physical Contest, Thinks That's Impressive

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What is it with liberals and wanting to fight people? Not one but three different Democratic presidential candidates have now publicly shared their bizarre desires to take on President Donald Trump physically, setting a questionable example from the party of alleged “tolerance.”

The latest Democrat to boast about challenging the president to a physical contest is Andrew Yang, the 44-year-old lawyer and entrepreneur. He was probably a bit desperate for attention, considering his middle-of-the-pack poll numbers.

While speaking at the Iowa State Fair this past weekend, the long-shot candidate went on a rant about Trump’s fitness while claiming that he could best the commander in chief at physical (and mental) feats.

“I don’t think Donald Trump could run a mile. Would you guys enjoy trying to watch Donald Trump run a mile? That’d be hysterical,” Yang said in comments captured by ABC News. “What does that guy weigh, like, 280 or something?”

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It might be one thing if the White House hopeful was making an offhand bad joke, but Yang doubled down on his comments and seemed to make physical fitness a voting issue.

“No one wants a president who doesn’t seem like they can run a mile,” he declared at one point. So, wheelchair-bound former President Franklin D. Roosevelt and chronically crippled former President John F. Kennedy (both Democrats) are obviously off his role models list.

Yang was just getting warmed up.

“I challenge Donald Trump to any physical or mental feat under the sun. I mean, gosh, what could that guy beat me at, being a slob? He’s an embarrassment,” the Democrat said.

Do you think Yang should drop out of the race?

According to The Atlantic, an aide tried to stop Yang from going further. Instead, the 2020 hopeful continued his rant, calling the current president “so fat” and then seemingly challenging him to a pushup contest. Yes, this really happened.

“I can do approximately infinity more pushups than Donald Trump,” Yang bragged.

“[W]hat could Donald Trump possibly be better than me at? An eating contest?” he went on.

“Like something that involved trying to keep something on the ground and having really large body mass? Like, if there was a hot-air balloon that was rising and you needed to try and keep it on the ground, he would be better than me at that, because he is so fat.”

The comments were so bad that even some voices on the left criticized them. Splinter News journalist Samantha Grasso accused Yang of hating fat people and being “fatphobic,” confirming once and for all that Donald Trump’s habit of eating at McDonald’s is “4D chess”-level brilliant.

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Okay, maybe he just likes burgers, but that certainly makes him seem a lot more normal to voters than Andrew “Let’s Run a Mile” Yang. It isn’t clear whom the Democrat was trying to impress, or why he thought a lengthy rant about a 73-year-old man’s body type would resonate with primary voters.

Yang isn’t the first Democratic presidential candidate to rant about physically challenging Trump. Former Vice President Joe Biden and New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker have both done so, with different levels of pent-up aggression.

“If we were in high school, I’d take him behind the gym and beat the hell out of him,” Biden said last year.

“I’ve been in a lot of locker rooms my whole life. I’m a pretty damn good athlete,” Biden blustered. “Any guy that talked that way was usually the fattest, ugliest S.O.B. in the room.”

Biden made comments similar to Yang’s in July. “Come on, Donald, come on, man. How many push-ups do you want to do here, pal?” he said.

Booker went a step further by fantasizing about punching the president.

“[M]y testosterone sometimes makes me want to feel like punching him, which would be bad for this elderly, out of shape man that he is if I did that,” he declared on NBC’s “Late Night with Seth Meyers,” before calling Trump a “physically weak specimen.”

Yes, we’re supposed to believe that of all the issues facing America, the most important is how much muscle the president has. This is all ridiculous, but it does provide an idea for the next Democratic debate: We’ll just set up an obstacle course and have the candidates sweat it out.

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Benjamin Arie is an independent journalist and writer. He has personally covered everything ranging from local crime to the U.S. president as a reporter in Michigan before focusing on national politics. Ben frequently travels to Latin America and has spent years living in Mexico.




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