Matt Damon says he is willing to work with President Trump on foreign aid
Matt Damon said he is hopeful that President Donald Trump will be open to addressing the issues of global poverty and clean water scarcity while in office, and that he is willing to give Trump the benefit of the doubt for now.
Damon attended the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, earlier this week to speak on behalf of Water.org, a nonprofit Damon cofounded in 2009. In an interview with USA Today, Damon discussed the idea of working with Trump to help solve the aforementioned global crises.
“We can work with anybody,” Damon said. “I think it remains to be seen what [Trump’s] relationship to foreign aid is, what his feelings are about about that. I haven’t heard him say anything publicly about that. So we’re just hoping for the best.”
During his campaign, the president pledged to decrease foreign aid and invest in domestic infrastructure instead, but Damon reiterated that he wanted to give Trump a chance to define his policies before making any judgments.
“We really just don’t know. It’s too soon to guess,” Damon said. “I think we have to give him a chance to assume his presidency and define what his relationship to foreign aid is going to be, and then we’ll go from there.”
Damon also said that he planned to dedicate much more of his time in 2017 to Water.org.
“I went on a pretty serious work jag for about 26 months there,” Damon said. “My time was really dominated by my day job, but that’s going to change this year.”
To comment, please create a screen name in your profile
To comment, please verify your email address
Conversation
This discussion has ended. Please join elsewhere on Boston.com