Donald Trump Believes Civil War Could Have Been ‘Negotiated’

Former President Donald Trump said during an Iowa rally on Saturday that the Civil War could have been “negotiated.”

Iowa Republicans will cast the first votes of the GOP primary on January 15, potentially determining the fate of Trump. Iowa plays a crucial role in presidential nominating contests, as a strong performance in the midwestern state can help candidates build momentum ahead of other early-voting states, such as New Hampshire and South Carolina. The former president, meanwhile, is the current Republican frontrunner in the primaries with 50 percent of voter support in Iowa, according to poll aggregator FiveThirtyEight.

During Trump’s rally in Newton, he said the Civil War, America’s deadliest conflict that ended slavery in the United States, could have been prevented.

“I don’t know what it is, the Civil War was so fascinating, so horrible—was so horrible, but so fascinating…This is something that could’ve been negotiated, you know, it was just for all those people to die,” Trump told the crowd on Saturday.

He continued: “Abraham Lincoln, of course if you negotiated, you probably wouldn’t even know who Abraham Lincoln was…It would’ve been different, but that would’ve been okay…I know the whole process that they went through and they just couldn’t get along and that would’ve been something that could’ve been negotiated and they wouldn’t have had that problem. But, it was a hell of a time.”

Newsweek reached out to Trump’s campaign via email for comment.

Former Representative Liz Cheney, a Wyoming Republican who has been a vocal critic of Trump, wrote on X, formerly Twitter, “Which part of the Civil War ‘could have been negotiated’? The slavery part? The secession part? Whether Lincoln should have preserved the Union? Question for members of the GOP—the party of Lincoln—who have endorsed Donald Trump: How can you possibly defend this?”

Journalist Michelangelo Signorile wrote in reaction to Trump’s remarks, “This one of the most insane things Trump has said. Could have negotiated slavery? Would love to hear the terms of that negotiation.”

“Trump making the case again that he was better than Abraham Lincoln because Lincoln was a warmonger,” posted Ron Filipkowski, editor-in-chief of MeidasTouch and a frequent Trump critic.

Christian Vanderbrouk, who served in former President George W. Bush’s administration, commented on Trump’s rally speech, and wrote on X, “Trump muses wistfully about allowing the south to have continued the practice of slavery.”

Trump wasn’t the only GOP presidential candidate to cause a stir from comments made about the Civil War.

Nikki Haley, former South Carolina governor and former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations in the Trump administration, received some heat for failing to say slavery was the cause of the Civil War at a campaign event in Berlin, New Hampshire, in late December.

At the town hall, Haley was asked to identify the cause of the Civil War, to which she replied: “I think the cause of the Civil War was basically how government was going to run. The freedoms and what people could and couldn’t do.”

After receiving backlash about her response, she said during a town hall in North Conway, New Hampshire, a day later, “Of course the Civil War was about slavery. We know that. That’s unquestioned, always the case, we know the Civil War was about slavery.”