Presumptive GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump acknowledged that he’s used an alias in the past in the real estate business - but continued to insist a recently-unearthed recording of a man claiming to be a publicist does not sound like him.
“When I’m in real estate and especially when I was out in Brooklyn with my father and I’d want to buy something,” Mr. Trump said during an appearance on “Jimmy Kimmel Live” that aired Wednesday. “Honestly, nobody knew who Trump was at that time. Nobody knew me, so it wasn’t…so important.”
“But I would never want to use my name because you had to pay more money for the land,” he said. “If you’re trying to buy land, you use different names.”
“I actually used [the] name Barron,” he said. “I ended up using my son because I made a very good deal using that name. I used an alias in terms of setting up a meeting with Mr. Donald Trump.”
Mr. Trump’s youngest son is named Barron.
“Many people in the real estate business do that,” Mr. Trump said. “And you have to, frankly - otherwise they find out it’s you and they charge you more money and nobody wants to pay more money.”
Mr. Trump also got asked about a recently-unearthed recording of a 1991 phone conversation between a People Magazine reporter and a man identifying himself as “John Miller” who said he did PR and spoke extensively about Mr. Trump.
Asked about the recording earlier this month on the “Today” show, Mr. Trump said it wasn’t him on the phone.
“It didn’t sound like me, though, really - you think that sounded like me?” Mr. Trump said.
“Yeah,” Mr. Kimmel said.
“I don’t,” Mr. Trump said.
“I will say this: to me, that didn’t sound like my voice,” Mr. Trump said.
• David Sherfinski can be reached at dsherfinski@washingtontimes.com.
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