With the 2024 election on the horizon, everyone’s talking about the two main candidates, Joe Biden and Donald Trump – even America’s sweetheart, Tom Hanks.
The Saving Private Ryan star was a guest in Normandy to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the D-Day landings. These marked the beginning of the Allied offensive in Western Europe and are considered a major point in liberating the continent from Nazi Germany.
While there Hanks was interviewed by CNN, and was asked a few questions about the future of democracy and the United States of America given the upcoming election.
What did Tom Hanks say about Donald Trump’s run for re-election?
Hanks was asked by CNN “Do you worry about the United States in case of its commitment to democracy and freedom and everything these people [D-Day veterans] died for if there’s another Trump presidency?”. Hanks replied:
“I think there’s always a reason to be worried about the short term. But I look at the longer term of what happened. […] Look, our Constitution says we the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union. That journey to a more perfect union has missteps in it. We know.”
Afterward, Hanks underlined how he and everyone can catalog these missteps and mistakes, at the same time acknowledging he’s “just a guy that makes movies and reads books and a late historian.” However, that didn’t stop him from sharing his opinion.
“Over the long term, however, we inevitably, make progress towards, I think, that more perfect union. […] Not because of someone’s narrative of who is right or who is a victim or not. It comes out of the slow melding of the truth. […] It comes down to the good deed, that is, that is practiced.”
He concluded his thoughts with a hopeful look towards the future:
“I will always have faith that the United States of America and the Western societies, that have adopted more or less the same sort of democracy, cannot help but turn towards what is right.”
Has Tom Hanks made any previous comments on Trump?
In 2016, Hanks was promoting Inferno and discussed Trump’s infamous “grab ‘her ’em by the pussy” remark:
“He was at work, man. He wasn’t in a locker room. He was at work. He was showing up to do a thing on camera. Look, I’m offended as a man. I’m not offended as a husband or a father. I’m offended as a guy. That’s just not right, I’m sorry.”
If you can’t recall, the controversy sparked when Donald Trump’s “locker room” comments to TV host Billy Bush were leaked. “I just start kissing them. I don’t even wait. And when you’re a star they let you do it. You can do anything,” is one of the few quotes from that tape.
Let’s face it, it’s hard to disagree with Hanks when he said, “that’s just not right.”