So, there they all were, paraded and offered to the public like willing slaves at an auction: Ben Carson, Herschel Walker, Tim Scott, Clarence Henderson, Vernon Jones and more. At least a dozen African-Americans spoke at the Republican National Convention last week, and all of them had essentially the same message: Donald Trump is not a racist.
What a grand display of buffoonery, almost as entertaining as a minstrel show. In fact, as far as the majority of African-Americans are concerned, it was a minstrel show.
And let’s stop beguiling ourselves with the fiction that this display of blindness to blatant racism, by the very same people who should be most perceptive of it, was meant to increase Donald Trump’s miniscule Black support. We’re not that stupid! Whenever Trump claims, “I’m the least racist person you’ll ever meet,” what comes to mind for most Black folks is a 900-pound crocodile proclaiming he’s the biggest vegetarian in the jungle.
No, this pageantry wasn’t for Black folks. It wasn’t to convince any “undecided” Black voters, because Black people decided about Donald Trump a long time ago. The man is a racist! That’s spelled R.A.C.I.S.T! And if you want an accounting of how Donald Trump has completely removed any doubt about that, keep reading. But regarding last week? That cacophony of Black voices claiming “da massa ain’t mean,” was strictly aimed at those already too-willing Trump supporters, or maybe a few “swing voters,” the ones too dumb to see racism even when it runs up and socks 'em in the jaw.
Just to set the record straight, Donald Trump’s support among African-Americans is abysmal! A recent Washington Post poll revealed that 92 percent of African-Americans support Joe Biden in the upcoming election. Trump’s percentage of Black support in the 2016 presidential election was barely 8 percent.
Notice any similarities? His support from Black Americans hasn’t budged in his nearly four years in office. And that’s despite the fact that Kanye West said he’s just the greatest guy on earth!
Once again, allow me to reiterate: Black folks ain’t stupid!
We were listening when Trump denigrated the man who made us all feel that America was finally our country too. We heard him when he told the world that our first Black president wasn’t an American, but a Kenyan, who lied his way into the White House (after all, they don’t call it that for nothin, ya know).
We were listening when he said there were some “very fine people” in a crowd of armed white supremacists, who marched through Charlottesville. We heard him way back in 1995, when he said that four Black men and one Hispanic man who were accused of a rape they didn’t commit should be executed. We were listening this week when he defended an armed white teenager, who traveled from Illinois to Wisconsin to “protect property,” but ended up killing two Black Lives Matter protesters and seriously wounding another.
Oh, and by the way, regarding Black Lives Matter, has anyone ever heard Donald Trump say he believes black lives do matter? Has anyone ever heard him explain that the movement isn’t saying black lives matter only, or that black lives matter more, but also? Did the President of the United States congratulate Washington D. C., Mayor Muriel Bowser for memorializing Black American lives by renaming Pennsylvania Avenue Black Lives Matter Plaza?
Has he ever, at any point, expressed sincere regret that Black Americans like Michael Brown, Laquan McDonald, Walter Scott, Sandra Bland, Tamir Rice, Eric Garner, Freddie Gray, Stephon Clark, Philando Castile, Breonna Taylor, Rayshard Brooks, George Floyd and Jacob Blake are killed, maimed or abused by police officers all across this nation? Has he promised police reform? Because that’s what matters to African-Americans. What we don’t need is a dozen Black folks out of a population of 47.4 million trying to force-feed us a mouthful of manure.
Trust me, we know who Donald Trump is. And we know what he is. As for those Black “patriots” who spoke so rapturously about him at the RNC, we in the Black community have an age-old, down-home term for them.
And it ain’t pretty.