Racial views of Donald Trump

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Donald Trump, the president of the United States from 2017 to 2021 and current president-elect of the United States, has a history of speech and actions that have been viewed by scholars and the public as racist or sympathetic to White supremacy. Journalists, friends, family, and former employees have accused him of fueling racism in the United States. Trump has repeatedly denied accusations of racism.[1][2] Conservative commentators point to the time he stated "whether you are black or brown or white, we all bleed the same red blood of patriots" as an example of him not being a racist. [3]

In 1973, Trump and his company Trump Management were sued by the Department of Justice for housing discrimination against African-American renters; he settled the suit, entering into a consent decree to end the practices without admitting wrongdoing.[4][5][6] From 2011 to 2016, Trump was a leading proponent of the debunked birther conspiracy theory falsely claiming president Barack Obama was not born in the United States.[7][8] In a racially-charged criminal case, Trump continued to state, as late as 2024,[9] that a group known as the Central Park Five mostly made up of African American teenagers were responsible for the 1989 rape of a white woman in the Central Park jogger case, despite the five males having been officially exonerated in 2002.[10][11][12] Trump launched his 2016 presidential campaign with a speech in which he said that Mexico sends criminals to the border: "They're bringing drugs. They're bringing crime. They're rapists. And some, I assume, are good people."[13][14] During the campaign, Trump used the fears of the white working class voters, and created the impression of global danger of groups that are deemed to pose a challenge to the nation.[15]

Trump made comments following a 2017 white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, that were seen by critics as implying moral equivalence between the white supremacist marchers and those who protested against them as "very fine people".[16][17] In 2018, during an Oval Office meeting about immigration reform, Trump allegedly referred to El Salvador, Haiti, and African countries as "shitholes", which was widely condemned as a racist comment.[18][19] In July 2019, Trump tweeted about four Democratic congresswomen of color, three of whom were American-born: "Why don't they go back and help fix the totally broken and crime-infested places from which they came. Then come back and show us how it is done."[20] News outlets such as The Atlantic criticized this comment as a common racist trope.[21] He later denied his comments were racist, saying "if somebody has a problem with our country, if somebody doesn't want to be in our country, they should leave."[22]

Trump's controversial statements have been condemned by many observers around the world,[5][23][24] but excused by some of his supporters as a rejection of political correctness[25][26] and by others because they harbor similar racial beliefs.[27][28] Several studies and surveys have shown that racist attitudes and racial resentment have fueled Trump's political ascendance, and have become more significant than economic factors in determining the party allegiance of U.S. voters.[28][29] Racist and Islamophobic attitudes have been shown to be a powerful indicator of support for Trump.[30]

  1. ^ "Donald Trump denies being a racist after 'shithole' row". BBC News. January 15, 2018. Archived from the original on April 27, 2019. Retrieved January 15, 2018.
  2. ^ "Trump denies new accusations of racism after Elijah Cummings attack". BBC News. July 29, 2019. Archived from the original on February 23, 2020. Retrieved May 25, 2020.
  3. ^ "Trump: We all bleed the same red blood | CNN Politics". CNN. April 30, 2017.
  4. ^ Cite error: The named reference Mahler was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  5. ^ a b Desjardins, Lisa (August 22, 2017). "What exactly Trump has said about race". PBS Newshour. Archived from the original on May 28, 2019. Retrieved March 22, 2021.
  6. ^ Lopez, German (August 13, 2020). "Donald Trump's long history of racism, from the 1970s to the 2020s". Vox. Archived from the original on February 12, 2019. Retrieved March 22, 2021.
  7. ^ Corn, David (January 12, 2018). "How Republicans Normalized Donald Trump's Racism". Mother Jones. Archived from the original on May 17, 2019. Retrieved March 22, 2021.
  8. ^ Lopez, German (November 29, 2017). "Trump is still reportedly pushing his racist "birther" conspiracy theory about Obama". Vox. Archived from the original on March 27, 2019. Retrieved March 22, 2021.
  9. ^ "Harris attacks Trump for trying to 'divide' Americans after he raises her race as an issue". Los Angeles Times. September 11, 2024. Retrieved September 11, 2024.
  10. ^ Cite error: The named reference Abramovitch was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  11. ^ Conlon, Edward (October 19, 2014). "The Myth of the Central Park Five". The Daily Beast. Archived from the original on May 5, 2017. Retrieved March 22, 2021.
  12. ^ Sarlin, Benjy (October 7, 2016). "Donald Trump Says Central Park Five Are Guilty, Despite DNA Evidence". NBC News. Archived from the original on May 27, 2019. Retrieved March 22, 2021.
  13. ^ Reilly, Katie (August 31, 2016). "Here Are All the Times Donald Trump Insulted Mexico". Time. Archived from the original on May 9, 2019. Retrieved January 13, 2018.
  14. ^ "Five Insults Donald Trump Has Fired at Mexicans in the Presidential Race". Sky News. September 1, 2016. Archived from the original on April 27, 2019. Retrieved March 22, 2021.
  15. ^ Inwood, Joshua (2018). "White supremacy, white counter-revolutionary politics, and the rise of Donald Trump". Environment and Planning C: Politics and Space. 37 (4): 579–596. doi:10.1177/2399654418789949. S2CID 158269272. Archived from the original on August 15, 2022. Retrieved August 18, 2022.
  16. ^ Cite error: The named reference nyt-boost was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  17. ^ Blake, Aaron (April 26, 2019). "Trump tries to re-write his own history on Charlottesville and 'both sides'". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on June 14, 2020. Retrieved June 11, 2020.
  18. ^ Cite error: The named reference wapo-20180111 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  19. ^ Weaver, Aubree Eliza (January 12, 2018). "Trump's 'shithole' comment denounced across the globe". Politico. Archived from the original on January 12, 2018. Retrieved January 13, 2018.
  20. ^ Rogers, Katie; Fandos, Nicholas (July 15, 2019). "Trump tells Dem congresswomen to 'go back' to 'fix' countries they came from". The New York Times. Archived from the original on July 16, 2019. Retrieved September 4, 2019 – via The Times of India.
  21. ^ Serwer, Adam (July 15, 2019). "Trump Tells America What Kind of Nationalist He Is". The Atlantic. Archived from the original on July 16, 2019. Retrieved July 16, 2019.
  22. ^ Morin, Rebecca (July 16, 2019). "Trump triples down on his controversial tweets about 'The Squad.' Here's what we know". USA Today. Archived from the original on February 15, 2020. Retrieved February 20, 2020.
  23. ^ Cite error: The named reference global rebuke was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  24. ^ Raymond, Adam K. (November 30, 2017). "British MPs Condemn 'Racist,' 'Incompetent' Trump for Endorsing 'Vile Fascist' Group". New York. Archived from the original on November 19, 2018. Retrieved January 13, 2018.
  25. ^ Salama, Vivian (January 12, 2018). "Trump's history of breaking decorum with remarks on race, ethnicity". NBC News. Archived from the original on January 13, 2018. Retrieved January 13, 2018.
  26. ^ Nichols, Laura (June 29, 2017). "Poll: Majority of Trump Voters Say His Political Correctness Is 'About Right'". Morning Consult. Archived from the original on January 14, 2018. Retrieved January 13, 2018.
  27. ^ Cillizza, Chris (January 12, 2018). "Trump's 'shithole' comment is his new rock bottom". CNN. Archived from the original on January 12, 2018. Retrieved January 13, 2018.
  28. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference nation-20170508 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  29. ^ Cite error: The named reference vox-20171215 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  30. ^ Lajevardi, Nazita; Oskooii, Kassra A. R. (2018). "Old-Fashioned Racism, Contemporary Islamophobia, and the Isolation of Muslim Americans in the Age of Trump". Journal of Race, Ethnicity, and Politics. 3 (1): 112–152. doi:10.1017/rep.2017.37. S2CID 158559765. Archived from the original on August 15, 2022. Retrieved August 18, 2022.