Donald Trump Reacts To Khizr Khan Calling Him Out, The Internet Reacts To #TrumpSacrifices

Donald Trump has reacted to Khizr Khan’s Democratic National Convention speech in the way only Donald Trump can. And to absolutely no one’s surprise, the internet has responded in true fashion.

The father of American soldier Humayun Khan, who died serving the U.S. in Iraq, Khizr Khan delivered a crushing rebuke on Donald Trump on the fourth day of the DNC in Philadelphia. Killed in a bombing in 2004, Captain Humayun Khan received a posthumous Bronze Star and a Purple Heart.

Accompanied by his wife, Humayun’s mother Ghazala, Khan spoke out against Trump in words that rang out loud and clear.

“You have sacrificed nothing and no one.”

Never one to turn down an opportunity for rebuttal, Trump, seemingly unable to question the army father, instead drew attention to the silence of Ghazala Khan as she stood beside her husband on the DNC podium.

Khan had held up a copy of the U.S. constitution and asked Donald Trump whether he had ever read it. However, Trump found the silence of his wife suspicious. In a telephone conversation with the New York Times‘ Maureen Dowd, Trump gave a simple one-liner.

“I’d like to hear his wife say something.”

Later, in a televised interview with ABC News, Trump explained this view further, saying that this was apparently something that people had been speaking about.

“[Khizr Khan] was, you know, very emotional and probably looked like a nice guy to me. If you look at his wife, she was standing there. She had nothing to say. She probably, maybe she wasn’t allowed to have anything to say. You tell me.”

Donald Trump seemed to be playing to the expectations of those in his support base who would take kindly to the idea that because Ghazala was a Muslim woman, she was not “allowed” to express her views.

However, it turns out that Ghazala Khan was invited to speak by her husband, but she was in too much pain to speak on the stage, she told ABC News.

“Please. I am very upset when I heard when he said that I didn’t say anything. I was in pain. If you were in pain you fight or you don’t say anything, I’m not a fighter, I can’t fight. So the best thing I do was quiet.”

The Washington Post reported on the fact that she also spoke about how her son’s photographs are a cruel reminder of his passing, which is why his enlarged photograph was placed behind the couple as Khizr spoke.

However, it was Donald Trump’s insistence at the ABC interview, that he too had made sacrifices for the sake of the country that sparked a Twitter hashtag called #TrumpSacrifices.

“I think I’ve made a lot of sacrifices. I work very, very hard. I’ve created thousands and thousands of jobs, tens of thousands of jobs, built great structures. I’ve had tremendous success. I think I’ve done a lot.”

The pronouncement that Donald Trump has made sacrifices has been taken with a dose of hilarity, and social media has been busy speculating on the nature of the sacrifices that Trump might have made.

#TrumpSacrifices – the struggles of becoming a man without a 'small $1M loan' from daddy.

— Jeffrey Wright (@jfreewright) July 31, 2016

Once survived an entire weekend at Mar-a-Lago with just one can of hairspray. #TrumpSacrifices

— Paul Begala (@PaulBegala) July 30, 2016

Donald Trump, however, is no stranger to widespread sound and fury following each of his interviews. For a man who has made whole speeches off self-congratulatory anecdotes, a hashtag is scarcely a blip in the path.

[Photo by John Moore/Getty Images]