President Donald Trump’s constant verbal assaults on black female journalists is completely unacceptable.
Earlier this month, Trump blasted CNN reporter Abby Phillip, CNN contributor April Ryan and PBS reporter Yamiche Alcindor, all of whom are African-American women.
Trump called Ryan a “loser” and repeatedly told her to “sit down” during a press conference and criticized Phillip for asking a “lot of stupid questions.”
Ryan was simply trying to get Trump to clarify his flip-flopping position on several government policies and Phillip had asked whether Trump wanted acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker to “rein in” special counsel Robert Mueller in the Russian investigation – certainly a legitimate question.
And Trump accused Alcindor of asking a “racist question” when she asked Trump to clarify his self-described title of “nationalist” and his thoughts about white nationalists—another valid question.
“Just in this week, both April Ryan, who is our contributor, and Yamiche Alcindor … they both attempted to ask the President serious questions, but we see an attempt to avoid questions that are difficult or tough,” Phillip said on CNN. “The answer to that question, Wolf, is extremely important and I think we deserve to get the answer to it.”
“There is a racial dimension to this,” CNN Chief Legal Analyst Jeffrey Toobin told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer on “The Situation Room.” “The fact that the President is always — the idea that this was some random selection of journalists he doesn’t like is not the case. “It’s always black people with this President.”
The National Association of Black Journalists released a statement calling Trump’s attacks “appalling.”
“The past two years have been filled with assaults on the media and Donald Trump’s comments this week have reached an all-time low with attacks on three black female journalists,” NABJ President Sarah Glover said in a statement. “His dismissive comments toward journalists April Ryan, Abby Phillip and Yamiche Alcindor are appalling, irresponsible, and should be denounced.”
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Trump is doing an abysmal job of handling race relations in America, according to a new poll.
In one of the first polls after the mid-term elections in which Democrats took control of the House, nearly 60 percent of Americans polled disapprove of the way Trump is managing race relations.
In a breakdown of a recent Quinnipiac University poll, 71 percent of Republicans approve of Trump’s efforts and half of white men polled approve of Trump’s handling of race relations. Ninety-three percent of Democrats disapprove and 91 percent of Black Americans disapprove of how Trump is managing race relations.
Rep. Maxine Waters may be coming for Trump.
And soon.
Now that Democrats have taken control of the House after the mid-term elections, Waters, a Democrat from California, is armed with something new and powerful: subpoena powers.
Waters is the head of the powerful House Financial Services Committee, which allows her to start investigations into Trump’s finances – a potentially damaging probe to Trump.
“The ball’s going to be in her court,” said Richard Hunt, president and CEO of the Consumer Bankers Association.
Waters, a frequent critic of Trump, recently responded to the fact that some Democrats have asked her to stop calling for Trump’s impeachment.
“There’s a difference in how some of our leadership talk about how we should handle all of this,” Waters told reporters. “They say, ‘Maxine, please don’t say impeachment anymore.’”
“And when they say that, I say ‘impeachment, impeachment, impeachment, impeachment, impeachment, impeachment, impeachment,’” she said.
Stay tuned.
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Trump is under fire for his reaction to a Japanese reporter’s question.
The reporter, who had an accent, began asking Trump a question regarding the economy during a recent press conference at the White House.
The president interjected, asking, “Where are you from, please?”
When the reporter responded with “Japan,” Trump told him to “say hello to Shinzo,” referencing the country’s prime minister, Shinzo Abe.
“I’m sure he’s happy about tariffs on his cars,” Trump said.
Then Trump said: “I really don’t understand you.”
The president’s handling of the question prompted criticism from many who said Trump’s response to the reporter was racist.
Trump also claimed to have not understood two other reporters of color at the same press conference. A female reporter with an accent had asked the president for thoughts about the Muslim women who had won seats in Congress, Rashida Tlaib of Michigan and Ilhan Omar of Minnesota.
“I don’t understand what you’re saying,” Trump responded.
Another reporter added, “I’m from Brooklyn, so you can understand me.”
And then another journalist with an accent, from Lebanon, asked Trump a question about Turkey’s president.
Trump responded, “Who? I don’t understand him.”
It appears that Trump can’t understand journalists of color even when they are speaking English.
What do you think?
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