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Donald Trump at a charity dinner in NY last week said to Hillary Clinton:

Who are they angry at? You or I.

German English schoolbooks teach "You and me" is right. Who is right? Does Trump use a more modern and more common form?

Oswald Franz
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  • As far as I know, you and I is the more formal version. You and me is usually used by most people. If you really want to go to town grammatically you could rephrase the sentence to say At whom are they angry?. The whom is necessary, grammatically, but the preposition doesn't have to go at the start, that's more of a rumour than anything. – BladorthinTheGrey Oct 25 '16 at 08:58
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    It should be "You or me." Are they angry at I? No. They are angry at me. – Mick Oct 25 '16 at 09:01
  • "Are you angry at I?" would sound very strange. I don't think adding "you" before "I" would make such a big difference. –  Oct 25 '16 at 09:02
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    Off-the-cuff remarks are often wrong, even including subconscious hypercorrection. – Andrew Leach Oct 25 '16 at 09:02
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    The quotation reads "you or I", not "you and I". It is WRONG. No-one would say "Are they angry at I?" It's quite simple to tell which to use in phrases like this by imagining that you leave out the other person mentioned. – Kate Bunting Oct 25 '16 at 09:03
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    Kids are often told to always say "you and I" as a way to correct sentences like "Me and you are going to the store." Unfortunately no one ever seems to realize that this is only true when "you and I' are the subject of the sentence! This hyper-correction leads to people, mostly native speakers, saying "you and I' even when "you and me" is correct. "You and I" is correct whenever you might say "we" or "I" (when the noun phrase is the subject) and "you and me" is correct whenever you might say "us" or "me" (when the noun phrase is an object). It's a common error but it really grates. – N. Post Oct 25 '16 at 09:59
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    @N.Post That really bugs I too. – John Clifford Oct 25 '16 at 10:12
  • As a predicative complement, I is tolerable. As a complement of a preposition, it is not. – eca2ed291a2f572f66f4a5fcf57511 Oct 27 '16 at 19:53

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