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The Trump Charity Timeline
A teen living in a Bronx group home unable to afford a corrective foot surgery, cried out in a letter in a newspaper. Donald Trump and Joe DiMaggio’s doctor picked up the phone. “I never had a day like this in my life,” Marcus Oquendo, 17, was quoted in yesterday’s Daily News editions. “Me and Donald Trump. He wants to meet me next week,” said sports columnist Mike Lupica.
Oquendo wrote to Lupica in a letter published last Friday, explaining that he was living at home in the Catholic Guardian Society, because his mother had died and his father was in prison. He had an average of 89 in school and as a junior 6-foot-10, he plays basketball for DeWitt Clinton High.
The last time Tony Bennett came to town, it was spectacular. He arrived at the White House for dinner Dec. 21 and almost immediately doubled over in pain. An ambulance went screaming from 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. to Georgetown University Medical Center, where the crooner had emergency surgery for a hernia.
“And then I had a tremendous recuperation, thanks to Donald Trump,” a chipper Bennett said yesterday. “He sent a private plane to bring me from Washington to New York and then down to Mar-a-Lago, where they worked on me at his spa. The White House got me the best doctor. It was like Arabian Nights,’ when the magic carpet comes.”
He may have left his heart in San Francisco, but when time comes to rest a weary body, Tony Bennett will take Palm Beach …to be specific, Mar-a-Lago.
No stranger to either, the crooner barely hesitated when Donald Trump offered him a lakeside guest house to recuperate from double hernia surgery. Bennett, 70, was stricken at a White House dinner and repaired Dec. 21 at Georgetown University Medical Center.
To speed recover, Tony is expected to do some painting, but he doesn’t expect to be off the concert circuit too long. If he does nothing before, you can bet he’ll be at The Breakers Jan. 25. He’s headlining the 40th annual International Red Cross Ball. He wouldn’t miss it.
Donald Trump has bottled and is selling his patented “You’re Fired” catchphrase. “The Apprentice” star is part of a celebrity art auction to raise money and awareness for prostate cancer.
To do his bit for the event, Trump painted a beer bottle donated by one of the sponsors, Grolsch Premium Lager. Trump’s bottle has his name painted around the neck of the bottle, along with what looks like a skyline of New York’s skyscrapers and his famous phrase “You’re Fired.”
Also participating in the auction is Woody Allen, who painted his signature black-rimmed eye glasses around his bottle, and Carson Daly whose bottle looks like either red butt cheeks or red chili peppers — depending on who’s looking at it.
The auction starts today (Oct. 7) on eBay and proceeds will go to the National Prostate Cancer Coalition’s Proctoberfest.
Transcript:
DONALD TRUMP: I think that’s fantastic. Okay, so here’s the story. You ready?
RUSH: Yeah.
DONALD TRUMP: Okay — and you can treat me terribly after I do this. It doesn’t make any difference to me how you treat me.
RUSH: Wait a second. Donald, I was wrong, it was over $3 million last year.
DONALD TRUMP: So in honor of you, because I love your show and whenever I can, I listen — and it’s not easy when you’re a business guy, right?
RUSH: I know.
DONALD TRUMP: Because, you know, the timing isn’t so great.
RUSH: That’s exactly right.
DONALD TRUMP: But I listen a lot. In honor of you, $100,000.
RUSH: Oh, my gosh! (chuckles)
DONALD TRUMP: That’s in honor of you, and now you can go and really beat me up. Go ahead, Rush.