By Colby Itkowitz | Washington Post

President Donald Trump refused Tuesday to apologize for the full-page ad he ran in 1989 calling for the execution of the “Central Park 5” and suggested the men might still be guilty, even though they were exonerated years ago.

Ten days after the brutal rape and beating of a female jogger in Central Park, Trump, then a real estate developer in Manhattan, took out a full-page ad in four New York City newspapers demanding the death penalty be reinstated for the five teenage boys of color arrested for the crime.

“The ad’s basically very strong and vocal, they are saying bring back law and order. And I’m not just referring to New York, I’m referring to everything,” Trump told Larry King at the time, echoing the kind of rhetoric he still uses.

Years later, the men were exonerated by DNA evidence and another man’s confession. The story is back in the news with a new Netflix miniseries, “When They See Us,” focused on the boys who were wrongfully convicted and served between six and 16 years of their young adulthood in jail.

April Ryan, a White House correspondent for American Urban Radio Networks, tweeted at the president early Tuesday asking if he’d apologize to the five men. Then, as the president left the White House for his reelection kick-off rally in Orlando, Florida, Ryan asked him in person.

“Why do you bring that up now? It’s an interesting time to bring that up,” Trump responded. “You have people on both sides of that. They admitted their guilt … some of the prosecutors think the city should never have settled that case and we’ll leave it at that.”

Trump has never apologized for his role in exacerbating the heightened emotions of that case. Several weeks before the 2016 election, Trump gave a similar answer to CNN, noting that the boys, then 14 through 16 years old, had admitted guilt.

The boys have said they were coerced by police to do so.

Yusef Salaam, one of the five boys, wrote a Washington Post essay in 2016 shortly after Trump doubled down on his contention that they were guilty of the crime.

“Trump has never apologized for calling for our deaths,” Salaam wrote. “It’s further proof of Trump’s bias, racism and inability to admit that he’s wrong.”