With no boogeyman, no strong economy, and Americans out of work
and dying by the thousands from a virus he refuses to take seriously,
racism’s kinda all that’s left.
I’m Francesca Fiorentini and in this episode of Newsbroke,
we’re looking at how many presidential candidates have run and won
simply by stoking white fear against Black Americans.
The difference is they weren’t so gauche about it!
That’s ‘cause Trump is what happens when you bury
the Nixon and Reagan presidencies in the Pet Sematary.
They come back...
...but different.
And you know what they say:
Sometimes dead is better.
[Intro theme jingle]
The impeached president is struggling.
The U.S. leads the world in COVID deaths thanks to his failure of leadership,
and as a result, the economy is tanking.
And sure, trusting the polls at this point
is just playing into Nate Silver’s weird math-based sex fantasies,
but they aren’t looking good for the president.
In particular, he might be losing one key demographic:
Donald Trump is now trailing in several recent polls among senior citizens.
Years ago, President Trump won with senior citizens
and this year, he is trailing in those polls.
In Florida, the president’s support among senior citizens is slipping.
Yeah, Trump is losing seniors.
Some to Joe Biden...
...and others to COVID-19.
But Trump losing seniors in Florida?!
That’s like Disneyland losing kids under 5.
Or this show losing first-generation Americans in social work school.
Thanks for being here.
What Trump has left is what’s been at the center of his presidency this entire time:
white identity politics.
Stoking white Americans’ fear of Black and brown people.
And with Black Lives Matter organizers
demanding racial justice and police accountability,
and then being brutalized by the police,
Trump is now banking his entire reelection on it.
Here’s just a sampling of proof from this summer’s buffet of bigotry:
These people are vandals, but they’re agitators, but they’re really...
...They're terrorists.
There will be no more low-income housing forced into the suburbs.
It’s been hell for suburbia.
Michael Cohen in a damning new tell-all claiming President Trump once said
Hispanic voters, like Black voters, in his words,
are too stupid to vote for him.
Why are African Americans still dying at the hands
of law enforcement in this country?
And so are white people.
So are white people.
What a terrible question to ask.
So are white people.
[Dramatic jingle]
You’re probably wondering,
"What went wrong in this workplace interaction?"
Catherine Herridge asked President Trump a question
that hinted at the existence of racism,
and that made him uncomfortable.
[Cheesy music]
I wish that video wasn’t relevant.
Most chillingly, Trump has been sending federal officers to cities
like Kenosha, Portland and Chicago,
where protesters have been disappeared into unmarked vehicles,
relentlessly teargassed and targeted by extremists.
And right wing commentators have justified the federal crackdown
with some choice comparisons:
This is going on every night that Portland looks like Baghdad.
The carnage is as intense as it is in Chicago, far more than in Baghdad.
Last month, gang members shot 15 people outside
a funeral home in Chicago. It looked like Fallujah.
Funny, the whole comparing American cities to Iraqi ones.
‘Cause that would make federal officers an occupying army.
Which is strange, because I thought the U.S. army loved when locals tear down statues?
Remember when these same pundits
said Trump would be an isolationist against foreign wars?!
Turns out, they were right.
“America first” wasn’t just a slogan.
It was a list of where to invade.
America first,
China second,
sh*thole countries third...
And while all of this is so horrific, nothing Trump does is original.
Not the campaign slogan,
not sending in federal troops to quell protests,
not even getting impeached for trying to get dirt on a political opponent
— that was this year, people.
When is time again?
Many presidential hopefuls and incumbents have resorted to demonizing
the Black community and social movements to win elections.
The term “law and order,” essentially loving the police real real hard,
was coined in 1964 by Republican presidential candidate Barry Goldwater.
The darkness that encourages crime?
Wow, it’s like he’s inventing racist dog whistles before our very eyes.
He’s like the Chuck Berry of hating people who look like Chuck Berry.
And for the zombie campaign that came out of the Pet Sematary,
“law and order” is now just a series of sporadic all-caps tweets.
You know, ‘cause of the worms in the brain.
Richard Nixon ran and won the presidency on a “law and order” platform,
in the midst of massive social movements in 1968
— you know, the year that used to hold title for “most volatile”
that I will now refer to as Nerf 2020.
Nixon took advantage of fears around Black power and left-wing activists
and their perceived lawlessness.
Just look at this campaign ad:
It is time for an honest look
at the problem of order in the United States.
Dissent is a necessary ingredient of change.
But in a system of government
that provides for peaceful change,
there's no cause that justifies resort to violence.
So I pledge to you,
we shall have order in the United States.
Sweet mother of God. What did those sick hippies do with the rest of that mannequin’s body?
I told you that’s what smoking grass does!
Also, wait, go back.
Is that Matt Lieb?
How is that possible?
What are you talking about? It looks nothing like me.
Dad?
And what do you know, some 50 years later,
the zombie campaign is running ads like this:
This is a taste of Biden’s America.
I mean this — the rioting, the crime: freedom is at stake now.
And this is going to be the most important election of our lifetime.
Is it Biden’s America?
‘Cause that slow motion footage is actually...
stock footage from Spain.
And also, Trump is president. So that would make this Trump’s America.
Trump’s deliberately ratcheting up violence
by sending in federal troops and encouraging vigilantism,
and then claiming he’s the only one who can stop it.
At this point, it’s not really a presidency,
it's a mafia protection racket.
It’d be a shame if something like Portland happened to your town.
I can help with that.
Nixon also called in the National Guard on thousands
of DC anti-war demonstrators in the largest sweep-arrest in U.S. history.
A move not unlike Trump’s
when he teargassed demonstrators outside of the White House
in a staged stunt to prove
he reds the Beeble.
Then in the ‘70s and ‘80s, another made-for-TV politician,
Ronald Reagan doubled down on Nixon’s race-baiting.
Before his run at the White House,
Reagan had built a name for himself as governor of California
by sending in California’s National Guard to violently put down demonstrators.
This is like a rite of fascists,
rite of fascist —
rite of passage.
Even before his racist war on drugs
and so-called welfare queens,
Reagan’s presidential campaign was premised
on the idea that the civil rights movement had gone too far,
and that the real racism was against white people
through things like affirmative action, or fairness in hiring.
Here he is in a campaign video criticizing bussing to integrate public schools:
The money now being wasted on this social experiment
could be better spent to provide
the kind of school facilities every child deserves.
Facilities like brand new bathrooms that only white students can use —
What? We’ve done that? Oh.
And different — Did you separate the drinking fountains? OK,
Well...
I’m just spitballing...
And now the undead incarnation of Reagan is trying to do away
with federal diversity training programs because apparently they’re divisive.
[Dramatic jingle]
George Bush Sr. in 1989 called his opponent, Democratic Governor Michael Dukakis,
soft on crime, in this classic — and pretty horrific — ad:
He allowed first-degree murderers
to have weekend passes from prison.
One was Willie Horton,
who murdered a boy in a robbery,
stabbing him 19 times.
Despite a life sentence,
Horton received 10 weekend passes from prison.
Horton fled, kidnapped a young couple,
stabbing the man and repeatedly raping his girlfriend.
Weekend prison passes. Dukakis on crime.
Oof. Yowza.
Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play?
Waka waka waka
[Laughter in background]
And finally, you had the Republican
who for some reason said he was a Democrat,
and picked up where Reagan’s welfare reform
and mass incarceration left off.
Clinton ran his reelection bid on the crime bill,
which he signed during his first term.
100,000 more police on the streets.
Expand the death penalty.
That’s how we’ll protect America.
No, that’s how you’ll lose the right
to ever speak about racial justice ever again.
All those presidents used race to win,
but even Nixon and Reagan were a far cry from instigating violence
from their supporters and then refusing to express any regret
when they go on murdering sprees.
And though it seems insane after all the racist rhetoric and voter suppression
that Trump would even try to reach Black voters,
he’s trying.
I’ve done more for the Black community
than any president in the United States
with the exception of Abraham Lincoln. And it’s true.
And even Abraham Lincoln had a black hat,
but did he put the word WOKE on it?
I don’t think so.
Trump may be way behind Biden when it comes to the national Black vote
— but he’s still somehow trying to earn it.
Specifically, the campaign is targeting Black men
in swing states like Michigan and Wisconsin.
Funny, ‘cause police are targeting the exact same group!
Jinx!
That means Biden is going to have to do a lot more to win over Black voters
than simply calling Trump “the first racist president.”
Because racism has been winning elections for decades.
And now, this zombie version of white identity politics
is resurrecting something we haven’t seen in say 100-150 years.
And it’s going to require an election, but so much more to rein it in.
The real question is, in the year 2020,
with so much hindsight into the failures of criminal justice reform and policing,
and with a new civil rights movement demanding real justice,
will the old political dog whistles still sway voters?
Will white Americans overlook all of the other failings of this president
just because he’s wrapping up their misconceptions of racial equality
into one simplistic package
— complete with an ugly hat and an unoriginal slogan?
Trump’s support from white men and women is still strong
but waning in the very suburbs he’s trying to unbrown.
Which means we can all still call our white friends and relatives
and ask them, “has Trump actually made your life better?”
And if that doesn’t work, ask them, “Hey, what is the name of your childhood pet?”
and “what’s your mother’s maiden name?”
and then hack into their Facebook and delete their accounts.
Will Trump be the hill that white America dies on?
Or will we, as a country, finally recognize that when it comes to white supremacy...
Sometimes...
...dead is better.
Hey, everyone, I really hope you share this video with your fam, and your people,
and maybe some of the people who are suffering white fragility in your life.
And let me know: What are those hard conversations that you've been having
with white people in your life?
And what do you think we need to be doing at this moment
beyond, you know, reading Angela Davis and bell hooks?
‘Cause like, there’s never a bad moment.
[Closing theme jingle]