John Legend: Trump ‘Corrupt,’ One of the ‘Worst People I’ve Ever Encountered’

John Legend’s opinion of President Donald Trump hasn’t changed a bit after 100 days.

In a brief interview with TMZ this week at the Time 100 Gala, the Grammy-winning musician pointedly called Trump “one of the worst people I’ve ever encountered in public life.”

“I think he’s a terrible president. Manifestly unqualified,” the 38-year-old “All of Me” singer told the outlet. “Not curious. Not good at legislating or doing anything that his job requires. Doesn’t have any depth about any subject. And he’s also using the office of the presidency as a way to make money for himself with his businesses, so he’s corrupt.”

“I can’t say anything nice about the guy, I think he’s one of the worst people I’ve ever encountered in public life,” Legend added.

Legend has been one of Trump’s most vocal celebrity opponents since well before the general election in November.

He has previously called the president “racist” and in June compared his supporters to people who allowed slavery to continue in the 19th century without realizing it was an evil practice.

Legend has kept up his criticism in the wake of Trump’s election, saying in February that he hoped the president would be gone by the completion of his first term in office.

“Hopefully ‘Trump’s America’ won’t last very long and we get him out of here within the next four years,” the singer told Fault magazine.

In an interview with the Independent earlier this month, Legend said he believes Trump has “already done enough to be impeached.”

“Now it’s just a matter of when Congress has the guts to do it,” he said. “And it may not happen until after 2018, but it may happen sooner if enough evidence is presented against him.”

In his interview with TMZ this week, Legend also defended former president Barack Obama’s upcoming speaking engagement at a conference run by investment bank Cantor Fitzgerald, for which he will reportedly be paid $400,000. When asked how Obama could justify accepting money to speak at a banking conference with his tough regulation of Wall Street, the singer said it was a “silly distinction” to make.

“He was never against Wall Street. The Dodd-Frank law and the other things he did were to regulate Wall Street so they wouldn’t cheat the American people and they wouldn’t destroy the financial system again,” he said. “And he did that, and he can still get paid to show up and speak somewhere.”

 

Follow Daniel Nussbaum on Twitter: @dznussbaum