Don’t say Donald Trump has never sacrificed for the red, white and blue.
As The Daily Beast reporter Olivia Nuzzi has amply documented, the real estate mogul and 2016 presidential contender has sued a stunning number of individuals, companies and countries over the years, for a whole host of reasons. But perhaps the most patriotic lawsuit Trump ever filed was in defense of a super-sized American flag he sported outside of his Mar-a-Lago country club estate in Palm Beach.
According to an Associated Press report from the time, Trump sued the town of Palm Beach in 1996 for millions of dollars after he was cited for flying a large American flag on an 80-foot pole, which apparently violated Palm Beach regulations mandating flags be flown on flag poles no higher than 42-feet.
“A smaller flag and pole on Mar-a-Lago’s property would be lost given its massive size, look silly instead of make a statement, and most importantly would fail to appropriately express the magnitude of Donald J. Trump’s and the Club’s members’ patriotism,” the lawsuit reportedly declared, before going on to state the town’s actions were in violation of, among other things, the First, Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments.
In a later filing obtained by The Daily Caller, Trump’s lawyers noted that Mar-a-Lago is larger than the White House, before explaining, “The size of the Club and its property demand that any flag on the premises be large in order to be viewed and to communicate the Club’s and Mr. Trump’s commitment to the flag and the nation.”
Before bringing the lawsuit, Trump lamented, “The day you need a permit to put up the American flag, that will be a sad day for this country.”
Has a greater American hero ever lived? Perhaps. But certainly not a glitzier American. Trump is by far the glitziest.
In January 2007, the town of Palm Beach voted to fine Trump $1,250 a day until he got in line with the town’s regulations of American flags. Still, ever the American patriot, Trump persisted.
Finally, in April 2007, Palm Beach and Donald Trump came to a resolution. Trump would be allowed to fly his ginormous flag on a 70-foot flag pole, instead of the 80-foot flag pole, and the city would waive all fines Trump had accrued. In exchange, Trump dropped his lawsuit against the city. He also apparently agreed to donate $100,000 to various veterans’ charities.
But this would not be Trump’s last battle over an American flag. In 2014, Trump took on local government officials in Rancho Palos Verdes, Calif. to keep another giant American flag up at his Trump National Golf Course, a fight Trump appears to have won without having to resort to litigation.