Trump denounces Streep as ‘overrated Clinton flunky’
NEW YORK: Donald Trump took on one of the Hollywood greats Monday, accusing Meryl Streep of being an overrated actress and a Hillary Clinton “flunky” after the multiple Oscar winner tore into him at an awards ceremony.
In what has become an early morning custom for the notoriously thin- skinned Republican president- elect, Trump took to Twitter to settle scores with the three-time Oscar winner just hours after her public broadside.
“Meryl Streep, one of the most overrated actresses in Hollywood, doesn’t know me but attacked last night at the Golden Globes,” Trump wrote. “She is a Hillary flunky who lost big.”
Streep berated Trump for his divisive rhetoric as she received a lifetime achievement award at the Golden Globes on Sunday in Los Angeles.
The 67-year-old fought to control her emotions as she received a standing ovation during her acceptance speech for the Cecil B DeMille Award, handed out by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association.
“You and all of us in this room, really, belong to the most vilified segments in American society right now. Think about it. Hollywood, foreigners and the press,” she said to her peers with a laugh, referencing Trump’s campaign that frequently disparaged immigrants and what he called biased media.
The US entertainment industry broadly supported Trump’s Democratic opponent Clinton, with many stars publicly endorsing her White House run and pumping millions of dollars into her campaign war chest.
Streep trashed the incoming president and singled out an infamous campaign speech during which he did a decidedly unf lattering impression of disabled New York Times reporter Serge Kovaleski.
“The person asking to sit in the most respected seat in our country imitated a disabled reporter -- someone he outranked in privilege, power and the capacity to fight back. It kind of broke my heart,” she said.
‘Disrespect, violence’
“This instinct to humiliate, when it’s modelled by someone in the public platform, by someone powerful, it filters down into everybody’s life, because it kind of gives permission for other people to do the same thing.”
“Disrespect invites disrespect. Violence incites violence,” she said.
“When the powerful use their position to bully others, we all lose.”
Trump has denied mocking Kovaleski and again defended himself on Monday against Streep’s accusation.
“For the 100th time, I never ‘ mocked’ a disabled reporter (would never do that) but simply showed him ‘grovelling’ when he totally changed a 16-year- old story that he had written in order to make me look bad,” Trump said in a series of tweets.
“Just more very dishonest media!” he added.
Trump told The New York Times in a brief telephone interview that he was “not surprised” to be criticised by “liberal movie people.”
His senior aide, Kellyanne Conway, dismissed Streep’s remarks as sour grapes, accused the actress of “inciting people’s worst instincts” and backed her boss as “absolutely right.”
Meryl Streep, one of the most overrated actresses in Hollywood, doesn’t know me but attacked last night at the Golden Globes. She is a Hillary flunky who lost big. Donald Trump, US President-elect