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President Trump posted a blatantly racist video clip portraying former President Barack Obama and the former first lady Michelle Obama as apes, then deleted it after an unusually strong outcry from members of his own party.
The clip, set to “The Lion Sleeps Tonight,” was spliced near the end of a 62-second video that promoted conspiracy theories about the 2020 election and was posted by Mr. Trump late Thursday night. It was the latest in a pattern by Mr. Trump of promoting offensive imagery and slurs about Black Americans and others.
Mr. Trump offered no immediate explanation for taking down the video, but one person familiar with the decision said that a “staffer” had posted the clip without the president’s knowledge. The person spoke on condition of anonymity to describe the decision-making.
The clip was in line with Mr. Trump’s history of making degrading remarks about people of color, women and immigrants, and he has for years taken aim at the Obamas in particular. Across Mr. Trump’s administration, racist images and slogans have become common on official government websites and social media accounts, with the White House, Labor Department and Homeland Security Department all having promoted posts that echo white supremacist messaging.
The video struck a nerve that the White House did not appear to anticipate. The depiction of Mr. and Mrs. Obama as apes perpetuates a racist trope, used historically by slave traders and segregationists to dehumanize Black people and justify lynchings.
Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina, the Senate’s only Black Republican and a close ally of Mr. Trump, wrote on X that he hoped the post was fake “because it’s the most racist thing I’ve seen out of this White House. The President should remove it.” Mr. Scott is the head of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, the party’s campaign arm in charge of holding the Senate, a key role ahead of the midterm elections in November.
Representative Mike Lawler, Republican of New York, said that the president’s post “is wrong and incredibly offensive.” Representative Michael R. Turner, Republican of Ohio, said the “racist images” of the Obamas were “offensive, heart breaking, and unacceptable.”
Senator Roger Wicker, Republican of Mississippi, said the president “should take it down and apologize.”
© 2015 Mutual Fund Observer. All rights reserved.
© 2015 Mutual Fund Observer. All rights reserved. Powered by Vanilla
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Following are excerpts from a current report in The Guardian:
Video deleted by White House breaks through numbness barrier and raises further questions about fitness for office
Comment: Perhaps there is undue concern about Trump falling asleep in meetings. He's likely to do minimal harm when asleep... it's when he's awake that's worrisome. Of course, most of the damage isn't really his fault... there's always that "anonymous White House staffer" to blame.
Bold text was added by me.
"So it was late last night — which happened to be the fifth day of Black History Month —
when at exactly 11:44 pm Trump posted a video that included a depiction of Barack
and Michelle Obama as monkeys."
"Now, we all know Trump is a loathsome human being.
His insults have become an odious staple of his presidency.
You may remember his AI-generated video of himself as a fighter pilot dumping excrement
on No Kings Day protesters. Or his AI-generated video of Chuck Schumer
and Hakeem Jeffries as mariachi performers."
"This morning, White House press secretary hurried into the White House press room
with her usual pooper-scooper to clean up the mess from last night’s racist post,
calling it nothing but 'an internet meme video depicting President Trump as the King of the Jungle
and Democrats as characters from the Lion King,” and adding, for good measure:
'Please stop the fake outrage and report on something today that actually matters to the American public.'"
"Well, it turns out plenty of Republican members of Congress were outraged, too — and they didn’t fake it.
'The most racist thing I’ve seen out of this White House,” posted South Carolina Republican Senator
Tim Scott, the sole Black Republican in the Senate. 'A reasonable person sees the racist context in this,'
posted Nebraska Republican Senator Pete Ricketts. 'Totally unacceptable,' posted Mississippi Republican
Senator Roger Wicker. 'Wrong and incredibly offensive,' posted New York Republican congressman
Mike Lawler. 'Offensive, heart breaking, and unacceptable,' posted Ohio Republican congressman Mike Turner.
"What happened then? Just before noon today, Eastern Time — some 12 hours after Trump
posted this piece of sh*t — the White House said it had been deleted.
No apology offered, of course. The White House blamed an unnamed 'White House staffer' for it."
"But you and I and anyone who has paid attention to Trump’s outbursts of bigoted offal
over the past months knows it came from him."
"Later tonight on Air Force One, Trump said that he had posted it himself.
When a reporter asked if he would apologize, he said, 'No, I didn’t make a mistake.'"
"While the post exhibited both the president’s vile racism and his failing impulse control,
it also seems to have been an attempt to use racism to break the growing coalition against him.
As when they arrested Black journalists Don Lemon and Georgia Fort as well as Black protesters
at a church while leaving white protesters free, Trump and his allies are hammering on racial fault lines.
As with the ape trope, the White House went so far as to digitally alter a photograph of church protester
and civil rights activist Nekima Levy Armstrong, who appeared to be quite composed during her arrest,
to make her look blacker and as if she is sobbing in terror."
"'They couldn’t break me,' Armstrong told Nil Köksal of Canadian news interview show
As it Happens.
'"And so they altered an image showing me broken.'
'I thought, am I that much of a threat to the world’s greatest superpower?'"
ISN'T HE DEAD YET?
2. When Gary Hart was caught in an extramarital affair in 1987, my parents said that infidelity was amongst the worst thing that a presidential candidate could do (next to starting a war for no good reason). Good riddance.
3. George W. Bush's Somalia adventure was bad. Good riddance.
4. When Bill Clinton had his Monica Lewinsky affair, that was even worse than Gary Hart. And he didn't inhale? Get real. Obama admitted that he inhaled, because that was the point! Good riddance Bill.
5. When George W. Bush invaded Iraq without U.N. approval, that was even worse than Nixon, Hart, Bush 1 or Clinton. Thousands of Americans and hundreds of thousands of Iraqis were killed. Then the horrible GFC. Good riddance W.
6. Obama had his issues, but I'd gladly vote for him again. Class personified.
7. Biden got kinda senile, but I voted for him in 2020 and would have voted for him again in 2024. I voted for Kamala, no alternative.
8. And then there's Trump.
He's on another level when it comes to a lack of morality. Seemingly every day in both of his terms is a new low in morality. Trump has made every one of these other presidents and presidential candidates that I've mentioned "Great Again". Good riddance Cheeto (can't come soon enough).
I didn't think that we could get any lower after Nixon, but wow, did we ever get lower! We're currently at the lowest of the low. I hate to imagine how much he, or any future USA president, could get any lower.
I'm sure that other presidents did disgusting things too, but they were before my time. Even Nixon and Hart were before my time, but I've heard and read alot about them.
I never really loathed any president or any elected official GOP or DEM like this imbecile."
I may have disliked some prior presidents and/or disagreed with their policies.
But, like you, I've never actually loathed any other president or elected official.
Donald J. Trump is the first—and hopefully last—president to earn this rare distinction!