Trump’s racist tweet not in line with American, Texan values

President Donald Trump is free to delete his Twitter account, or to use it to offer comments that aren’t completely disgusting, overtly racist, and at odds with American and Texan values.

This past weekend, however, Trump made a different choice. On Sunday, he launched a vile attack on four women of color who serve in Congress: Democrats Rashida Tlaib, Ayanna Presley, Ilhan Omar and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. The four, who were elected last year, had spent the previous week openly sparring with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. And although all four are U.S. citizens and three were born in this country, Trump made it clear that he considers them foreigners who should mind their own business rather than “loudly and viciously” telling Americans how their government should be run.

“Why don’t they go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came?” Trump asked in a Sunday-morning Twitter rant.

Make no mistake about it, these comments were racist. The label is one that journalists are typically reluctant to apply to comments made by political leaders on either side of the aisle, particularly the occupant of the White House. But it’s simply an accurate way to describe these comments, and it’s the label that journalists should use in this case, even if there are other labels that are also accurate but less controversial.

For example, it would be accurate to describe Trump’s tweets as “nativist” or “xenophobic.” All four of the women he’s referring to have been advocating for immigrant families since they were sworn in to Congress. They’re Americans who serve in the legislative branch of the federal government at a time when the executive branch is led by a Republican, Trump, who might as well have run as a Know-Nothing. (The Know Nothing Movement sprang up in the mid-19th centu

ry and was hostile to that era’s immigrants, particularly Catholics).

With that said, the four liberal House members whom Trump assailed aren’t from the same background as each other, nor the same states. They’re also not the only progressives in Congress who have been critical of Pelosi — they don’t believe her agenda is progressive enough — or the Trump administration.

Trump singled them out in a series of tweets casting the four as indistinguishable from one other and not “really” American. Really? Ocasio-Cortez and Trump were both born in New York City, as it happens, though the 73-yearold president is from Queens and the 29-year-old congresswoman known as “AOC” is from the Bronx.

Americans should be able to see that Trump is trying to play on — or, indeed, exacerbate — old racial divisions. Few elected Republicans were willing to challenge Trump because the GOP is largely his now, but a few did.

“I think those tweets were racist and xenophobic,” said U.S. Rep. Will Hurd, who represents the 23rd Congressional District and is the only black Republican in Congress.

Trump on Monday made it clear that he does not think such concerns are worth taking seriously.

“It does not concern me because many people agree with me,” the president boasted at a news conference.

By Tuesday, the president was declaring that the true racists were the people who have labeled his tweets “racist.”

“Those Tweets were NOT Racist,” Trump tweeted.

“I don’t have a Racist bone in my body!” he added, before going on to say that his only grievance with the four “progressive” Democratic lawmakers was that they didn’t love this country as much as he and his supporters purport to do.

Trump reportedly sees a political advantage in a feud with the four liberal lawmakers, who he claims are representative of today’s Democratic Party.

But Trump’s racist tweets should give all Americans pause. The economy is doing well, granted, but the president of our country apparently does not understand the values of our nation, or why they are valuable. Trump clearly does not realize or care that telling Americans to “go back” to their own country is a reprehensible thing to say, for example — and hurtful, to many of the Americans who have heard it, at various points, in their own country.

Playing on racial divisions is nothing new in American politics. Southern Democrats ran racist campaigns promoting segregation in the decades before civil rights legislation was passed under LBJ, and Republicans ranging from Richard Nixon to the late North Carolina Sen. Jesse Helms tried more subtly to exploit those divisions in later years.

Trump, who launched his 2016 presidential campaign by claiming that many of the Mexicans coming across the border illegally were criminals and “rapists,” may now think that his escalation of racebaiting is a smart political strategy that will serve him well in 2020. But it should be obvious that racist attacks on people of color, and immigrant families, will not go over as well in Texas as in other parts of the country.

Many of Texas’ Republican leaders have so far showed very little courage in standing up to our Know-Nothing president. Now would be a good time to start.