Nutter on Trump tweet: ‘He does not know me’

By now, you’ve certainly heard that Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter called Donald Trump an “a–hole” Tuesday. The GOP presidential candidate fired back via Twitter, calling the mayor a “low life” this morning just as Nutter was about to go live on WHYY’s “Radio Times” program.

Here’s the tweet:

.@Mayor_Nutter of Philadelphia, who is doing a terrible job, should be ashamed for using such a disgusting word in referring to me.Low life!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 9, 2015

No sooner did the mics open on “Radio Times” than host Marty Moss-Coane asked Nutter to respond. The mayor said he stands by his description of Trump and called his comments “yesterday’s news.”

“He needs to focus a whole lot less on me,” Nutter said. “He does not know me at all and doesn’t know anything about the city of Philadelphia.

“He needs to clean up the mess that he has been making, including yesterday, and apologize to members of the Muslim faith and citizens of the United States of America for his intolerable views,” Nutter said referring to Trump’s proposal to ban Muslims from entering the country until national leaders “can figure out what is going on.”

Nutter called Trump an “a–hole” during a press conference Tuesday afternoon where he gathered with incoming mayor Jim Kenney and religious leaders to denounce whoever threw a severed pig’s head at a mosque in Northeast Philadephia. (Nutter said the investigation into that incident is ongoing.) It followed comments he made earlier in the day saying he’d like to ban Trump from the city. 

In Philadelphia, the response to Trump’s tweet was as swift as you’d expect.

Philadelphia Magazine’s Dan McQuade was quick to point out the GOP candidate didn’t even get Nutter’s twitter handle right:

This is not @Michael_Nutter’s Twitter handle, making this even better. https://t.co/aa0wfH5HP6

— Dan McQuade (@dhm) December 9, 2015

And the Philadelphia Inquirer’s Aubrey Whelan noted the hypocrisy in Trump calling out Nutter for using one of his favorite words:

That “disgusting word” Nutter used is one the Donald is actually pretty fond of: https://t.co/tNH1KdqlEY https://t.co/E0wAXVVHmv

— Aubrey Whelan (@aubreyjwhelan) December 9, 2015

Nutter was on “Radio Times” to talk legacy as he prepares to leave office after eight years. Trump made his thoughts clear on that score, claiming Nutter was doing a “terrible job.” One person who got in touch with the call-in show had this to say:

Caller: Doesn’t agree with @Michael_Nutter on everything, except that Trump thing. . .

— NewsWorks (@NewsWorksWHYY) December 9, 2015

This spat is clearly destined to become part of the Nutter mythology — along with his love of performing Sugar Hill Gang’s “Rapper’s Delight.” You can listen to the full Radio Times exit interview here.