Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has fired back at Barry Diller after the media mogul threatened to leave the the United States if Trump were elected.
Trump tweeted Saturday, “Little Barry Diller, who lost a fortune on Newsweek and Daily Beast, only writes badly about me. He is a sad and pathetic figure. Lives lie!”
Diller slammed Trump in a Bloomberg Businessweek piece published Tuesday, calling the candidate “a huckster,” adding, “If Donald Trump doesn’t fall, I’ll either move out of the country or join the resistance.”
Diller’s IAC owns the website The Daily Beast and financed its merger in 2010 with the magazine Newsweek. That ill-fated move led to Newsweek ceasing print publication in 2012. The magazine was then sold off to and revived by IBT Media. Diller said in a 2013 interview that it was a “mistake” and “a fool’s errand” to buy Newsweek.
“Lives lie” is an apparent reference by Trump to Diller’s personal life. The mogul married Diane Von Furstenberg in 2001.
But he has long been reported to be one of the media world’s most prominent gay executives, a perception of Diller that has been documented in books such as Tom King’s “The Operator” and James B. Stewart’s “Disney War.”
Trump later Saturday retweeted a statement from one of his supporters, who wrote, “They used to call Barry Diller the father of ‘e-commerce’-what a joke that was – and that he is. 100%clueless on Internet.”
Little Barry Diller, who lost a fortune on Newsweek and Daily Beast, only writes badly about me. He is a sad and pathetic figure. Lives lie!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 10, 2015
“@Clint_Goodrich: They used to call Barry Diller the father of “e-commerce”-what a joke that was – and that he is. 100%clueless on Internet” — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 10, 2015