John Wayne: Family Backs Away from Trump Endorsement

Would late American icon John Wayne have given an endorsement to GOP frontrunner Donald Trump? Not so fast, according to his family and estate. If you missed the story, here’s a rundown. Earlier...
John Wayne: Family Backs Away from Trump Endorsement
Written by WebProNews
  • Would late American icon John Wayne have given an endorsement to GOP frontrunner Donald Trump?

    Not so fast, according to his family and estate.

    If you missed the story, here’s a rundown.

    Earlier this week, Donald Trump accepted the endorsement of Wayne’s daughter Aissa, all while standing in front of a John Wayne statue in Iowa.

    “America needs help and we need a strong leader. We need someone, like Mr. Trump, with leadership qualities, someone with courage, someone that’s strong — like John Wayne,” Aissa Wayne said at the John Wayne Birthplace Museum in Winterset, Iowa. “”If John Wayne were around, he’d be standing right here.”

    Trump was thrilled with the apparent endorsement, saying,

    “This is very important to me because of John and his whole legacy. I met him one time and it made such an impression. When you talk about bigger than life, there aren’t too many people bigger than life… It’s an honor to be here, it’s a tremendous honor to have your support and endorsement.”

    But not so fast.

    Not everyone in the Wayne family is on board with Trump, or more specifically handing out endorsements from dead men.

    “John Wayne Enterprises and John Wayne Cancer Foundation wish to state that Aissa Wayne acted independently of both organizations and the Wayne family in her endorsement of Donald Trump,” Enterprises president Ethan Wayne said in a statement. Ethan Wayne is John Wayne’s son. “No one can speak on behalf of John Wayne and neither the family nor the foundation endorses candidates in his name.”

    Throughout most of his life, John Wayne was an outspoke conservative Republican.

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