West Baltimore residents say Trump tweets don’t solve issues

Residents are defending their home and condemning the words of a president they say doesn’t represent them

As the sun beat down on North Avenue, a line formed in front of Big O’s Hand Car Wash, where a man was selling snowballs.

While Damon Minor waited for his Tutti Frutti-flavored snack, the conversation turned to the presidential tweetstorm that’s turned a national spotlight on Baltimore and the civil rights leader who has long represented it in Congress. The man in front of Minor scoffed that President Donald Trump had dared call Rep. Elijah Cummings a racist.

In the city that Trump has labelled “a disgusting, rat and rodent infested mess” where “no human being would want to live,” residents are defending the place they call home and condemning the words of a president they say doesn’t represent them or have the right to trash their community.

“He’s just ignorant,” the 46-year-old Minor said of Trump. “If it’s so bad here, give more government funding to our city.

“I was born and raised here and I love my city very much,” he said. “Yes, we have our issues. There’s a whole lot of fixing that needs to be done, but what place doesn’t need some fixing?”

A segment on Fox News appears to have launched the president on his three-day Twitter tirade. In it, a Republican strategist from Baltimore County called Cummings’ district the “most dangerous” in America and showed video of boarded-up rowhouses and trash-strewn alleys in West Baltimore.

Those who live in that part of the city acknowledge the problems it faces.

Residents say they want elected officials