By Steve Eder
In
the fall of 1968, Donald J. Trump received a timely diagnosis of bone
spurs in his heels that led to his medical exemption from the military
during Vietnam.
For 50 years, the
details of how the exemption came about, and who made the diagnosis,
have remained a mystery, with Mr. Trump himself saying during the
presidential campaign that he could not recall who had signed off on the
medical documentation.
Now a
possible explanation has emerged about the documentation. It involves a
foot doctor in Queens who rented his office from Mr. Trump’s father,
Fred C. Trump, and a suggestion that the diagnosis was granted as a
courtesy to the elder Mr. Trump.
Mr.
Trump, center, during his senior year at the New York Military Academy.
He would receive a medical exemption from the draft a few years later.CreditFred R. Conrad for The New York Times
Image
The
podiatrist, Dr. Larry Braunstein, died in 2007. But his daughters say
their father often told the story of coming to the aid of a young Mr.
Trump during the Vietnam War as a favor to his father.
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“I
know it was a favor,” said one daughter, Dr. Elysa Braunstein, 56, who
along with her sister, Sharon Kessel, 53, shared the family’s account
for the first time publicly when contacted by The New York Times.
Elysa
Braunstein said the implication from her father was that Mr. Trump did
not have a disqualifying foot ailment. “But did he examine him? I don’t
know,” she said.
For decades, Dr.
Braunstein saw patients in a congested ground-floor office below
Edgerton Apartments in Jamaica, Queens, one of dozens of buildings owned
by the Trumps in the 1960s. The family sold the building in 2004,
records show.
A
portrait of Dr. Braunstein from his podiatry school yearbook. His
daughters say he made the diagnosis as a favor to Fred C. Trump,
Donald’s father.
Image
“What
he got was access to Fred Trump,” Elysa Braunstein said. “If there was
anything wrong in the building, my dad would call and Trump would take
care of it immediately. That was the small favor that he got.”
No
paper evidence has been found to help corroborate the version of events
described by the Braunstein family, who also suggested there was some
involvement by a second podiatrist, Dr. Manny Weinstein. Dr. Weinstein,
who died in 1995, lived in two apartments in Brooklyn owned by Fred
Trump; city directories show he moved into the first during the year
Donald Trump received his exemption.
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Dr.
Braunstein’s daughters said their father left no medical records with
the family, and a doctor who purchased his practice said he was unaware
of any documents related to Mr. Trump. Most detailed government medical
records related to the draft no longer exist, according to the National
Archives.
In an interview with The Times
in 2016, Mr. Trump said that a doctor provided “a very strong letter”
about the bone spurs in his heels, which he then presented to draft
officials. He said he could not remember the doctor’s name. “You are
talking a lot of years,” Mr. Trump said.
The
yearbook photo of Dr. Manny Weinstein, who may have also played a role
in the medical exemption, according to Dr. Braunstein’s daughters.
Image
But he suggested he still had some paperwork related to the exemption, which he did not provide.
Mr.
Trump did not mention in that interview any connection between his
father and the doctor. The White House did not make Mr. Trump available
for a follow-up interview and did not respond to written questions about
his service record.
An investigation by The Times in October showed the extent to which Fred Trump had assisted his son
over the years, despite Donald Trump’s insistence to the contrary. The
investigation revealed that Mr. Trump received the equivalent today of
at least $413 million from his father’s real estate empire, including
the equivalent of $200,000 a year by age 3.
In
the 1960s, there were numerous ways to avoid military service,
especially for the sons of wealthy and connected families, but Mr. Trump
has said that no one pulled strings for him.
“I
didn’t have power in those days,” Mr. Trump told the biographer Michael
D’Antonio in a 2014 interview, according to transcripts shared with The
Times. “I had no power. My father was a Brooklyn developer, so it
wasn’t like today.”
Dr.
Alec Hochstein, who worked with Dr. Braunstein in the late 1990s, said
the podiatrist had recalled over dinner with their wives how the Trumps
had treated him well, including backing off from rent increases. Dr.
Hochstein did not remember any discussions related to Mr. Trump’s
medical exemption.
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“He
spoke very highly of the Trumps, and they were very open to negotiating
with him and letting him stay in the space at a rent he was comfortable
with,” Dr. Hochstein said.
Dr.
Nicholas Campion, who bought Dr. Braunstein’s practice around the time
that the Trumps sold the building, which was less than a mile from the
Trump family home in Jamaica Estates, said Donald Trump had had a large
presence in the community.
“Everybody recalls the Trump family around Jamaica Estates,” Dr. Campion said.
In
recent years, the diagnosis of bone spurs has subjected Mr. Trump to
ridicule from critics, who have found it implausible that a healthy and
athletic 22-year-old, on the cusp of being declared fit for service,
could suddenly be felled by growths in his heels. Mr. Trump’s own
shifting narrative over the years about his Vietnam-era experience has
added to the suspicions.
At
the time of the diagnosis, Mr. Trump was navigating a tumultuous period
for the country after he graduated from the University of Pennsylvania.
The United States inducted about 300,000 men into the military in 1968.
At that time, a year before the draft lottery was instituted, local
boards had to meet quotas and called men for service, leaving those
without deferments or exemptions vulnerable.
Mr.
Trump had been declared available for service two years earlier and
undergone a physical exam, Selective Service records show. That exam did
not result in a medical exemption, but he did receive an education
deferment. When officials again declared him available for service in
July 1968, he had exhausted four education deferments and finished
school, so it was the medical exemption that kept him from being
eligible.
He has often said it was
“ultimately” a high draft lottery number that spared him, but Mr. Trump
had been medically exempted for more than a year before the lottery
began in December 1969.
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Beginning
in October 1968, records show, Mr. Trump had a 1-Y classification, a
temporary medical exemption, meaning that he could be considered for
service only in the event of a national emergency or an official
declaration of war, neither of which occurred during the conflict in
Vietnam. In 1972, after the 1-Y classification was abolished, his status
changed to 4-F, a permanent disqualification.
Dr.
Braunstein’s office was below Edgerton Apartments, one of dozens of
buildings owned by the Trumps in the 1960s. The family sold the building
in 2004, records show.CreditDave Sanders for The New York Times
Image
The
Times began looking into Mr. Trump’s draft record anew when an
anonymous tipster suggested that a podiatrist who was a commercial
tenant of Fred Trump’s had provided the medical documentation.
The
tipster offered no names, but The Times used old city directories, held
by the New York Public Library, and interviews with Queens podiatrists
to identify Dr. Braunstein.
The
doctor’s daughters said his role in Mr. Trump’s military exemption had
long been the subject of discussions among relatives and friends.
“It was family lore,” said Elysa Braunstein. “It was something we would always discuss.”
She
said her father was initially proud that he had helped a “famous guy”
in New York real estate. But later, her father, a lifelong Democrat who
had served in the Navy during World War II, grew tired of Donald Trump
as he became a fixture in the tabloid gossip pages and a reality
television star, she said. The daughters, both Democrats, say they are
not fans of Mr. Trump.
Dr.
Braunstein’s daughters said his role in Mr. Trump’s military exemption
had long been the subject of discussions among relatives and friends.CreditSharon Kessel
Image
Mr.
Trump has had a complicated relationship with the military, having
quarreled with the likes of Senator John McCain, a prisoner of war
during Vietnam; the parents of a slain soldier; and the architect of the
Osama bin Laden raid, even while speaking during campaign rallies about
his enthusiastic support for veterans and the armed forces. He has also
been critical of people who have been less than forthright about their
Vietnam records. Earlier this month, he chided Senator Richard
Blumenthal, Democrat of Connecticut, over misleading statements he made
years ago about his own Vietnam record, calling him “Da Nang Dick” on Twitter.
Dr.
Braunstein’s daughters said that when he discussed Mr. Trump’s medical
exemption, he often mentioned Dr. Weinstein, though it was unclear to
them what role Dr. Weinstein may have played. He was close to the
family, they said, and known as Uncle Manny.
The
two men forged a close friendship after meeting in podiatry school in
New York, from which they graduated in 1953. Dr. Weinstein was among the
oldest students in the class, classmates said, and Dr. Braunstein was
remembered for being among the smartest.
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One
possible explanation that has been raised over the years, the
Braunstein sisters said, is that Dr. Weinstein had a connection to the
draft, as some private practitioners did. In fact, multiple doctors
would have been involved in the final determination.
Dr. Weinstein rented an apartment from Fred Trump in Brooklyn, moving in the same year that Donald Trump received the exemption.CreditDave Sanders for The New York Times
Image
Before
people were inducted into the service, they underwent a physical exam
overseen by military doctors, court records from that era show. Men
could bring along documentation of medical concerns from private
physicians. That information was presented at their exams and considered
by a medical officer. Often, a civilian specialist working with the
exam station would be asked to review the case and make a
recommendation. A local draft board would finalize the man’s
classification.
Dr. Weinstein
practiced podiatry in Brooklyn’s Bath Beach neighborhood, maintaining an
office near another Trump building, Shore Haven Apartments. In 1968,
phone books show, Dr. Weinstein moved into an apartment in Westminster
Hall, a Trump-owned building. He lived in that building for many years,
and later lived in another owned by the Trumps.
Dr. Weinstein had no children and never married, but some people who knew him were surprised by a possible Trump connection.
When
Dr. Weinstein closed his practice in the late 1980s, he referred
patients to a nearby podiatrist, Dr. Mark L. Schwartz. When contacted by
The Times, Dr. Schwartz said he had never heard about a possible
connection between Dr. Weinstein and the Trumps.
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