For a story about Donald J. Trump’s childhood home of Jamaica Estates, Queens, I talked to the presidential candidate about the role his father, Fred C. Trump, played in developing the neighborhood. I also asked him about a 1927 report in The New York Times, unearthed by the website Boing Boing, that listed Fred Trump as being among a group of people arrested, and then discharged, by the police in response to a Ku Klux Klan rally that had turned violent in Queens. The question, essentially, was, “Did you ever hear of this?”

Mr. Trump’s barrage of answers – his sudden denial of a fact he had moments before confirmed; his repeatedly noting that no charges were filed against his father in connection with the incident he had just repeatedly denied; and his denigration of the news organization that brought the incident to light as a “little website” – shows his pasta-against-the-wall approach to beating down inconvenient story lines.

Here is a transcript of our conversation on the subject.

Q. Growing up, you lived on Wareham Place?

A. We lived on Wareham, prior to my father building that one [on Midland Parkway] which was right next door but a street away.

Q. Did your father live on Devonshire Road before that?

A. That was a different one, that’s where my grandmother lived and my father, early on.

Q. Have you seen this story about police arresting a Fred Trump who lived at that Devonshire address in 1927 after a Ku Klux Klan rally turned violent?

A. Totally false. We lived on Wareham. The Devonshire — I know there is a road Devonshire but I don’t think my father ever lived on Devonshire.

Q. The Census shows that he lived there with your mother there. But regardless, you never heard about that story?

A. It never happened. And by the way, I saw that it was one little website that said it. It never happened. And they said there were no charges, no nothing. It’s unfair to mention it, to be honest, because there were no charges. They said there were charges against other people, but there were absolutely no charges, totally false.

Somebody showed me that website — it was a little website and somebody did that. By the way, did you notice that there were no charges? Well, if there are no charges that means it shouldn’t be mentioned.

Because my father, there were no charges against him, I don’t know about the other people involved. But there were zero charges against him. So assuming it was him — I don’t even think it was him, I never even heard about it. So it’s really not fair to mention. It never happened.

Later in the interview, Mr. Trump returned, unprompted, to the 1927 report after expressing dissatisfaction with a previous article about him.

A. And by the way, my father was not involved, was never charged and I never even heard this before. What? It comes out on a website and you are going to write it on The New York Times?

It shouldn’t be written because it never happened, No. 1. And No. 2, there was nobody charged.

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