President Trump Praises Bernie Marcus, Home Depot Co-Founder

WASHINGTON, DC — President Donald Trump overnight tweeted his support for Bernie Marcus, one of the founders of metro Atlanta-based The Home Depot, for his support of the president's reelection campaign. The global home improvement retail giant opened its first store 4o years in metro Atlanta, and Marcus, in a recent Fox News interview, said the company could never have been founded if Democrat Bernie Sanders, currently running for president, were sitting in the Oval Office.

Marcus, 90, was a top donor to Trump's 2016 presidential campaign, according to Fox News. Forbes reports Marcus has a net worth of $5.9 billion, and Marcus has committed to helping Trump will reelection.

Last month, Marcus told the AJC that “[Trump’s] got a businessman’s common sense approach to most things. Do I agree with every move that he makes? No, I don’t. But the truth is he has produced more than anybody else. He has. If we look at this country, I would say that we are better off today than we were eight years ago or six years ago.”

Some of the president's opponents have since launched a social media campaign under the hashtag #boycotthomedepot as a result of Marcus' support of the president. Late Tuesday night, the president fired back at Marcus' critics:

A truly great, patriotic & charitable man, Bernie Marcus, the co-founder of Home Depot who, at the age of 90, is coming under attack by the Radical Left Democrats with one of their often used weapons. They don’t want people to shop at those GREAT stores because he contributed....
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July" class="redactor-linkify-object">https://twitter.com/realDonald... 10, 2019

....to your favorite President, me! These people are vicious and totally crazed, but remember, there are far more great people (“Deplorables”) in this country, than bad. Do to them what they do to you. Fight for Bernie Marcus and Home Depot!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July" class="redactor-linkify-object">https://twitter.com/realDonald... 10, 2019

The first of two Home Depot stores opened in Atlanta on June 22, 1979. The stores were around 60,000 square feet each, cavernous warehouses that dwarfed the competition and stocked 25,000 products, much more than the average hardware store at that time.

More: Home Depot Wouldn't Exist If Sanders Were President: Home Depot Co-Founder

Today, The Home Depot, based in Smyrna, Georgia, is the world's largest home improvement retailer with nearly 400,000 associates and more than 2,200 stores in the U.S., Canada and Mexico. The typical store today averages 105,000 square feet of indoor retail space, interconnected with an e-commerce business that offers more than one million products for the DIY customer, professional contractors, and the industry's largest installation business for the Do-It-For-Me customer.

In fiscal 2018, The Home Depot had sales of $108.2 billion and earnings of $11.1 billion. Both Marcus and co-founder Arthur Blank have since retired from their roles in the company, with Marcus founding The Georgia Aquarium and Blank becoming one of professional sports' higher profile owners, with the NFL's Atlanta Falcons and 2018 MLS Cup champions Atlanta United.