by Preston Brady III
December 13, 2025
President Donald Trump is fighting a lawsuit filed by the National Association for the Deaf, who want an American Sign Language interpreter to be allowed at press conferences as they were under the Biden administration.
The most, so far, that anyone has extracted from the reason provided by Trump and his press secretary Karoline Leavitt, is “image concerns.”
The president in the past has displayed a disdain for people with disabilities, insinuating that disabled people are weak and in some cases the reason for the disability is a fault or failure of the disabled person. During a 2015 campaign rally Trump mocked a New York Times reporter with a condition affecting his arm. He later denied he was mocking the disability, just the individual.
In reports from former Trump aides, Trump made remarks about wounded veterans appearing with him, and that it “doesn’t look good for me.” He often refers to political opponents as mentally disabled, and very frequently categorizes people in disagreement with him as having mental problems.
It’s very easy to conclude that Trump doesn’t want an American Sign Language interpreter at his press conferences because he thinks it makes him look bad or weak. He is not a champion of disabled people, including veterans. He appears to view disabilities as a sign of weakness and that some or all of the blame for the disability is due to the individual disabled.
There has been little or no pushback from his core supporters the MAGA.
Most observers following this story are not surprised. Trump is the first president in American history whose most controversial moves firmly reflect his base support. Spurred by the Internet in-your-face culture favored by most of his supporters, the president embraced this movement and even created his own Truth Social media platform where he appears to hold back nothing in his tirades against perceived enemies.
In recent weeks on live television he has called one reporter “piggy” and referred to other women as fat and lazy, called Illinois Governor JB Pritzker a “big fat slob,” referred to Somalis as garbage he doesn’t want in America.
He once referred to Elizabeth Warren as Pocahontas. He refers to Democrats in general as radical, far-left and socialist. He uses “fake news media” in response to negative reports about him or his administration. He refers to the former president as sleepy Joe and to Rep. Adam Schiff as sleazy Schiff, Nancy Pelosi as crazy Nancy. He likes using adjectives such as deranged, thug or clown when issuing personal attacks. Other favorite words Trump often uses: stupid, dumb, corrupt, weak, loser, ugly, nervous mess, fake, phony, liar.
In a fair and just democracy one would expect Trump to lose the case against the National Association for the Deaf, but with a majority of the The Supreme Court delivering him one win after the other in the mounting court cases against him, it will surprise few if he wins his battle to protect his image from, as he seems to indicate, being tainted by people with disabilities.
Preston Brady III is editor and publisher of MobileTribune.com