In 2011 Robert De Niro and Donald Trump started their long-running feud, which is still going

A look into Robert De Niro and Donald Trump's long running feud that started back in 2011. (Instagram)

US President Donald Trump has garnered quite a lot of critics over the years. From Sabrina Carpenter to Tom Hanks, Ariana Grande, Green Day, and more, many icons in the entertainment industry have called him out on his politics, his actions, and his ideology.

However, one of the longest-running Hollywood critics of the well-known politician has been Robert De Niro, who is best known for his work in ‘The Intern,' 'Heat,' 'Casino,' and ‘Raging Bull,' to name a few.What started in 2011 with De Niro comparing Trump to a car salesman and the politician calling the veteran star “unintelligent” has transformed into one of the longest-running feuds that Hollywood has seen. Here is a look into how one offhand comment from both of the public figures transformed De Niro into an avid critic of Trump.

How did the feud between Donald Trump and Robert De Niro start?

In 2011, when Barack Obama was the president of America, the citizenship, or the ‘birther’ conspiracy, was on the rise, and Trump was one of the many major politicians who continued to add fuel to the fire at the time. For context, the ‘birther’ conspiracy refers to rumors that started about Obama’s citizenship and how he had never been born in the US or had been born in Kenya, among other things.During the 2011 Tribeca Film Festival, during a panel discussion, De Niro had publicly called Trump out for his comments about the conspiracy.

Calling him "totally crazy” for his views during the panel, De Niro had added, “He's talking about how he's going to go out and do this investigation... He's like a car salesman.”In retaliation, Trump, while featuring on ‘Fox & Friends,' commented on the actor’s intelligence for opposing his comments about Obama’s ‘birther’ conspiracy.

The main escalation during the 2016 elections

Over the years, De Niro has passed quite a bit of comments about Donald Trump, the main part of the feud fired up during the 2016 US elections.

A few months before the election took place, De Niro had called Trump a number of names while talking to an audience in Sarajevo to mark the 40th anniversary of his film ‘Taxi Driver’. At the time he had stated, “What he’s been saying is really totally crazy, ridiculous … he is totally nuts.

I don’t know, it’s crazy that people like Donald Trump. He shouldn’t even be where he is, so God help us.”The Guardian reported that the ‘Goodfellas’ star was also part of a campaign that was being run to urge people to vote during the 2016 elections.

For the #VoteYourFuture initiative, De Niro urged people to use their votes in the November polls for the election, where he talked about the state of the country and called Trump out.

Over the years, Robert De Niro has been extremely vocal about his disdain over Donald Trump's politics and actions. (Instagram)

In the video, he stated, “He’s so blatantly stupid. He’s a punk. He’s a dog. He’s a pig. A con. A bullshit artist. A mutt who doesn’t know what he’s talking about. I’d like to punch him in the face.” The video was considered too “partisan” and was not made a part of the final campaign; instead, it was released separately.

After Trump’s win, while talking to the outlet, the veteran actor had stated, “He’s president now … half the country is horrified, many parts of the world are, and we’re going to see how he does.

That’s it. I give the benefit of the doubt that he’s going to try his best to do the right thing.”He mentioned the US president in another comment while giving the Brown University commencement speech in May of that year. He said, “When you started school, the country was an inspiring, uplifting drama.

You are graduating into a tragic, dumbass comedy. My advice is to lock the [university’s] Van Wickle gates and stay here.”

Robert De Niro’s off-handed comments in 2017

The next year, the actor made multiple remarks about Donald Trump, who was serving his first term as president of the US. During a benefit in May 2017, as per the Los Angeles Times, the actor made comments on Trump’s administration, saying, “The administration’s mean-spiritedness towards our art and entertainment is an expression of their mean-spirited attitude about people who want that art and entertainment, people who also want and deserve decent wages, a fair tax system, a safe environment, education for their children, and healthcare for all.

”

Robert De Niro’s speech during the 2018 Tony Awards

The next major jab from the beloved artist came from the actor’s speech at the 72nd Tony Awards ceremony at Radio City Music Hall. While he had gotten up on stage to introduce Bruce Springsteen, instead of using his scripted intro for the segment, the veteran actor gathered a standing ovation from the crowd as he simply said, “I’m gonna say one thing: F*** Trump. It’s no longer down with Trump. It’s f*** Trump.” Following this, Trump officially retaliated in a social media post on Twitter, which is now known as X.

He had called De Niro a "very low-IQ individual," adding that he had "too many shots to the head by real boxers in movies," further calling him "punch-drunk."

Robert De Niro compares Donald Trump to history’s worst fascists

The actor, in 2024, passed more comments about Trump during an interview with The Guardian. He stated, “If he had his way, we’d wind up in a very bad state in this country. I mean, the way I understand it, they laughed at Hitler. They all look funny. Hitler looked funny, Mussolini looked funny, and other dictators and despots look funny.”He also drew comparisons with the mob, as he himself is famously known for playing mob bosses on the big screen. His comment read, “I mean, a mob boss calls people ‘a rat.' That means you lied and somebody snitched on you, so you did commit the crime. So that’s interesting, and he makes mobsters look bad because there are mobsters who will shake your hand and keep their word. He can’t even do that.”During his feature on ‘The Late Show With Stephen Colbert,' he took another jab at Trump, comparing him yet again to mob bosses.

He stated during the interview, “Even gangsters have morals, and they have ethics. They have a code, and you know when you give somebody your word, it’s your word, because all you have is your word. This guy, he doesn’t even know what that means.”During Trump’s criminal trial in New York in May 2024, De Niro held a full-on press conference outside the Manhattan courthouse on behalf of the Biden-Harris campaign. During the conference, he talked about the Trump administration and how the politician threatened American democracy.

To this, Trump responded on his own social media application, Truth Social, calling De Niro "a wacko" and "pathetic."

Robert De Niro’s latest comments about the President of America

Earlier this year in February, while talking about Trump on Nicolle Wallace’s MS NOW podcast, ‘The Best People,' De Niro teared up as he called the president out for his actions and talked about the state of the country. He openly stated, “Trump is the enemy of this country; let’s not kid ourselves,” adding, “It’s that simple.

Everybody has to stick together to get them out and get back on track. We can all argue and fight about our little differences and all that.

This is the big problem.”He also weighed in on whether Trump will step down at the end of his term in 2029, to which the ‘Heat’ star disagreed and said, “He won’t leave.” He firmly added, “Let’s not kid ourselves. He. Will. Not. Leave. It’s up to us to get rid of him. We have to make sure … We’ve got to get rid of him.

He’s going to ruin the country. People have to mobilize now and be ready for the midterms.” De Niro, further on in the interview, also talked about how people need to “mobilize” against this and that they need to work together for something to actually happen.

Earlier this year, De Niro even shared that he had once given Trump the benefit of the doubt. However, he added that he regretsdoing that now, and that the politican will not leave his seat even when his presidency comes to an end. (YouTube)

Trump later took to his social media account to address the comment and said, “Trump Deranged Robert De Niro [is] another sick and demented person with, I believe, an extremely low IQ, who has absolutely no idea what he is doing or saying—some of which is seriously CRIMINAL! When I watched him break down in tears last night, much like a child would do, I realized that he may be even sicker than Crazy Rosie O’Donnell.”This week, the actor outright admitted that he regrets giving Trump the benefit of the doubt, adding, “Trump joked about being ‘president for life’ with [Chinese president Xi Jinping] and so on. He’ll pardon anybody; he’ll do anything. The day after he was elected, I went on a TV show and said I’d give him the benefit of the doubt and say that I hope he won’t be as bad as I think he will be, but he’s turned out to be a lot worse.”Over the years, Robert De Niro has come to be known for his direct and unfiltered comments and criticism over Donald Trump’s actions and policies, and the politician has also replied his fair share of times to such comments as well.