New York businessman and Donald Trump ally Carl Paladino is being urged to resign from his position on the Buffalo School Board after he told a local publication this week that he wants to see President Obama and his wife killed and sent to Africa, respectively.

Mr. Paladino, an honorary co-chairman of Mr. Trump’s New York campaign, has endured an avalanche of criticism since Thursday this week when Buffalo’s Artvoice published his responses to a brief survey where he was asked “What would you most like to happen in 2017?” and “What would you like to see go away in 2017?”

“Obama catches mad cow disease after being caught having relations with a Herford. He dies before his trial and is buried in a cow pasture,” Mr. Paladino responded to the first question.

“Michelle Obama. I’d like her to return to being a male and let loose in the outback of Zimbabwe where she lives comfortably in a cave with Maxie, the gorilla,” he said in response to the second.

Mr. Paladino, 70, acknowledged the responses were his own when asked by the Buffalo News to verify the authenticity of the remarks.

“Yeah, I’m not politically correct,” he said. “They asked what I want, and I told them.”

His unfiltered answers have sounded an alarm given Mr. Paladino’s role on the Buffalo Public School Board, however, and have earned rebuke from Republicans and Democrats alike in the days since.

“Carl’s comments are absolutely reprehensible, and they serve no place in our public discourse,” Mr. Trump’s transition team said in a statement Friday.

“His remarks do not reflect the sentiments of opinions of any New Yorker and he has embarrassed the good people of the state with his latest hate-filled rage,” said Gov. Andrew Cuomo, Democrat.

Mr. Paladino’s latest controversial comments are hardly his first since entering the public eye decades ago when he began making a name for himself through a Buffalo-based real-estate company. His 2010 Republican gubernatorial campaign was complicated by the release of emails he had shared containing pornographic images and racial epithets, and last year he garnered criticism for commenting on the “damn Asians” and other “foreigners” attending the University at Buffalo.

Despite being reelected to a second-term on the school board just this year, Mr. Paladino’s future there is uncertain in the aftermath of his recent remarks. Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz, a Democrat, called on Mr. Paladino to resign in the wake of his latest comments, as has New York State Assemblyman Sean Ryan, Buffalo Democrat, among others.

Nonetheless, Mr. Paladino on Friday stood by his remarks in a statement Friday where he accused the media of misconstruing his words.

“It has nothing to do with race. That’s the typical stance of the press when they can’t otherwise defend the acts of the person being attacked,” Mr. Paladino said.

“Michelle hated America before her husband won. She then enjoyed all the attention, the multi -million dollar vacations, the huge staff and other benefits. Then when Hillary lost, she and Barack realized that without Hillary, there was no one to protect the little, if any, legacy he had. That’s when Michelle came out and said there is no hope for America. Good, let her leave and go someplace she will be happy,” he said.

“As for Barack, he’s a yellow-bellied coward who left thousands to die in Syria and especially Aleppo and he gets on TV and says he feels bad he couldn’t do anything about it,” he added.

Speaking to Buffalo’s WBEN radio this week, Mr. Paladino said he would not resign from his school board role notwithstanding the response to his remarks. Nonetheless, more than 4,000 people signed a petition as of Saturday morning urging the state commissioner of education to remove him from office.

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