Of course he’s a racist. Why do you ask?by digby
We knew Donald Trump was a full blown racist. It’s just that we don’t usually hear him talking like George Wallace. He’s usually spouting bullshit about how “they” (Mexicans, Muslims, African Americans) are all criminals and promising to restore “law and order” as his cover.
Here he is talking in private:
According to six officials who attended or were briefed about the meeting, Mr. Trump then began reading aloud from the document, which his domestic policy adviser, Stephen Miller, had given him just before the meeting. The document listed how many immigrants had received visas to enter the United States in 2017.
More than 2,500 were from Afghanistan, a terrorist haven, the president complained.
Haiti had sent 15,000 people. They “all have AIDS,” he grumbled, according to one person who attended the meeting and another person who was briefed about it by a different person who was there.
Forty thousand had come from Nigeria, Mr. Trump added. Once they had seen the United States, they would never “go back to their huts” in Africa, recalled the two officials, who asked for anonymity to discuss a sensitive conversation in the Oval Office.
As the meeting continued, John F. Kelly, then the secretary of homeland security, and Rex W. Tillerson, the secretary of state, tried to interject, explaining that many were short-term travelers making one-time visits. But as the president continued, Mr. Kelly and Mr. Miller turned their ire on Mr. Tillerson, blaming him for the influx of foreigners and prompting the secretary of state to throw up his arms in frustration. If he was so bad at his job, maybe he should stop issuing visas altogether, Mr. Tillerson fired back.
Tempers flared and Mr. Kelly asked that the room be cleared of staff members. But even after the door to the Oval Office was closed, aides could still hear the president berating his most senior advisers.
He’s the guy who called for the Central Park Five to be executed and when they were all exonerated said they were guilty anyway.
It’s who he is. We knew that. And, by the way, it’s the main reason Trump voters like him so much.
What this story shows is that Trump wants to cut off immigration for anyone Trump doesn’t like. Which means anyone who isn’t white and/or rich. Trump, like his voters, wants an America that only looks like him.
Update: Little reminder of the way the man who serves as Trump’s model for the presidency spoke about racial and ethnic minorities, Richard Nixon:
‘In his private roll calls of perceived enemies, African Americans never ranked as high as liberal Jews, but in his rants about race and ethnicity (Jews were obnoxious, the Irish were mean drunks, Mexicans were thieves) he stirred in theories of black inferiority. “Most of them basically are just out of the trees”, he told appointee, Donald Rumsfeld’, the author writes.
‘I have the greatest affection for them, but I know they ain’t going to make it for five hundred years’, Nixon told Ehrlichman and Haldeman. ‘The Mexicans are a different cup of tea. They have a heritage. At the present time they steal, they’re dishonest…[but] they do have some concept of family life, at least. They don’t live like a bunch of dogs, which the Negroes do live like.’
Peas in a pod.
As always I’m immensely grateful for all of you who drop by to read this creaky old blog. It’s what keeps me going. Together we will get through this.
Happy Hollandaise everyone! Keep the faith.
cheers — digby
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