--- title: Donald Trump: Rodrigo Duterte Comparison Didn't Bother Him description: President Trump decision to extend a White House invitation this weekend to President Rodrigo Duterte of the Philippines is drawing condemnation from rights groups and... canonical: https://time.com/4761595/donald-trump-rodrigo-duterte-white-house-invitiation/ author: Zeke Miller article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-05-01T15:45:04.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-23T04:40:56.265Z article:section: Politics og:title: President Trump Didn't Shy Away From Comparison to Philippine President og:description: In a 2016 interview with TIME. og:url: https://time.com/4761595/donald-trump-rodrigo-duterte-white-house-invitiation/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf4233a6a09f16526/6988cb63656a3fe62ebcfc90/trump.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: President Donald Trump during an event for the Independent Community Bankers Association in the Kennedy Garden of the the White House on May 1, 2017 in Washington og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: President Trump Didn't Shy Away From Comparison to Philippine President twitter:description: In a 2016 interview with TIME. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf4233a6a09f16526/6988cb63656a3fe62ebcfc90/trump.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # President Trump Didn't Shy Away From Comparison to Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte by [Zeke Miller](https://time.com/author/zeke-j-miller/) ## Zeke Miller May 1, 2017 3:45 PM UTC  President Donald Trump during an event for the Independent Community Bankers Association in the Kennedy Garden of the the White House on May 1, 2017 in Washington President Donald Trump during an event for the Independent Community Bankers Association in the Kennedy Garden of the the White House on May 1, 2017 in WashingtonMandel Ngan—AFP/Getty Images by [Zeke Miller](https://time.com/author/zeke-j-miller/) ## Zeke Miller May 1, 2017 3:45 PM UTC President Trump decision to [extend a White House invitation](http://time.com/4760798/donald-trump-rodrigo-duterte-white-house-visit/) this weekend to President Rodrigo Duterte of the Philippines is [drawing condemnation](http://time.com/4761274/donald-trump-rodrigo-duterte-invitation-criticism/) from rights groups and doubts within the Administration. But the President—who pushed a tough-on-crime message in his campaign for the White House—has hardly tried to place distance between himself and controversial leader before. The White House announced Saturday that Trump invited Duterte “to discuss the importance of the the United States-Philippines alliance, which is now heading in a very positive direction.” But Duterte has encouraged a [deadly extrajudicial crackdown](http://time.com/philippines-drug-war/) on drug users and dealers in his country, in which vigilantes have killed thousands. In an interview with TIME on Nov. 29, Trump sounded the alarm about drug gangs in the U.S., and when pressed about whether his rhetoric sounded similar to Duterte’s, he didn’t shy away from the comparison. “Well, hey, look, this is bad stuff,” he said about U.S. gangs, in an interview for TIME’s [2016 Person of the Year](http://time.com/time-person-of-the-year-2016-donald-trump-choice/) issue. “They slice them up, they carve their initials in the girl’s forehead, O.K. What are we supposed to do? Be nice about it?” “And this is part of the reason I won,” Trump added. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4761595/donald-trump-rodrigo-duterte-white-house-invitiation/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4761595/donald-trump-rodrigo-duterte-white-house-invitiation/"},"headline":"President Trump Didn't Shy Away From Comparison to Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte","datePublished":"2017-05-01T15:45:04.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-23T04:40:56.265Z","description":"President Trump decision to extend a White House invitation this weekend to President Rodrigo Duterte of the Philippines is drawing condemnation from rights groups and...","url":"https://time.com/4761595/donald-trump-rodrigo-duterte-white-house-invitiation/","keywords":["Donald Trump","Foreign Policy","White House","Philippines","Rodrigo Duterte"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf4233a6a09f16526/6988cb63656a3fe62ebcfc90/trump.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Zeke Miller","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/zeke-j-miller/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf4233a6a09f16526/6988cb63656a3fe62ebcfc90/trump.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"President Donald Trump during an event for the Independent Community Bankers Association in the Kennedy Garden of the the White House on May 1, 2017 in Washington","caption":"President Donald Trump during an event for the Independent Community Bankers Association in the Kennedy Garden of the the White House on May 1, 2017 in Washington","creditText":"Mandel Ngan—AFP/Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/donald-trump/","name":"Donald Trump"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4761595/donald-trump-rodrigo-duterte-white-house-invitiation/","name":"President Trump Didn't Shy Away From Comparison to Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte"}}]}] ```