Yesterday, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar and their “Squad” held a press conference to denounce President Trump’s attack on them. They got plenty of support from the press, which now routinely characterizes Trump’s tweetstorm against them as racist. Like, for example, the Associated Press and my home town newspaper the Star Tribune (“After being singled out by President Donald Trump with racist tweets….”).
The claim that Trump’s tweets were racist is false, as I wrote here. Apparently it is now “racist” to criticize “Congresswomen of color” as the Squad is often described. (For the record, AOC is paler than I am, and I am of Norwegian descent. But the meaning of words like “race” and “color” is flexible and mostly politically determined.)
This morning, President Trump again took to Twitter to renew his battle with the Squad:
The Democrat Congresswomen have been spewing some of the most vile, hateful, and disgusting things ever said by a politician in the House or Senate, & yet they get a free pass and a big embrace from the Democrat Party. Horrible anti-Israel, anti-USA, pro-terrorist & public…..
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 16, 2019
…..shouting of the F…word, among many other terrible things, and the petrified Dems run for the hills. Why isn’t the House voting to rebuke the filthy and hate laced things they have said? Because they are the Radical Left, and the Democrats are afraid to take them on. Sad!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 16, 2019
If you come after the President, the Country, the Flag – he’s going to defend himself. What the squad doesn’t like is that Donald Trump is enforcing the very laws that are on the books that were put there by Congress.” Jason Chaffetz. Also, buy Jason’s great new book, POWER GRAB!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 16, 2019
Our Country is Free, Beautiful and Very Successful. If you hate our Country, or if you are not happy here, you can leave!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 16, 2019
Those Tweets were NOT Racist. I don’t have a Racist bone in my body! The so-called vote to be taken is a Democrat con game. Republicans should not show “weakness” and fall into their trap. This should be a vote on the filthy language, statements and lies told by the Democrat…..
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 16, 2019
…..Congresswomen, who I truly believe, based on their actions, hate our Country. Get a list of the HORRIBLE things they have said. Omar is polling at 8%, Cortez at 21%. Nancy Pelosi tried to push them away, but now they are forever wedded to the Democrat Party. See you in 2020!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 16, 2019
It is true, as Trump says, that the four Congresswomen are anti-American, far left, and disliked by most Americans. This is why Nancy Pelosi has tried to rein them in. Construing Trump’s attacks most charitably, and overlooking the fact that he was flat-out wrong in talking about the Squad returning to the countries from which they came (all but one were born in the U.S.), he evidently is trying to tie the unpopular far-left Democrats to the party’s tail in anticipation of next year’s elections, perhaps hoping the GOP can re-take the House.
Most Washington Republicans are either condemning the president’s attacks, or avoiding reporters. The RNC, on the other hand, has supported him by releasing a series of tweets backing up his criticisms with video clips of Squad members. Yesterday House Democrats introduced a resolution condemning “President Donald Trump’s racist comments.” The resolution is largely a paean to immigration. I assume it will be voted on imminently, and will pass. It will be interesting to see whether some House Republicans vote for it.
President Trump has defended himself quite ably on Twitter, but the percentage of Americans who get their news from Twitter is vanishingly small. What most Americans are seeing is a consensus expressed in the press that President Trump is a racist. Defending himself against that pervasive charge, soon to be embodied in a House resolution, is hardly the position the president wants to be in.
That said, having dug the hole as deep as it currently is, Trump may as well continue his efforts to make Omar, Ocasio-Cortez, Tlaib and Pressley the face of the Democratic Party. They are, as he says, far-left, socialist, dictator-supporting, America-hating anti-Semites.
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