In response to news that President Trump’s senior strategist Steve Bannon will leave the White House, Nebraska Democratic Party Chair Jane Kleeb and DNC national press secretary Michael Tyler released following statements:
“While we are happy to see Bannon go, no departure of staff matters as much as Pres. Trump realizing he is giving power to White Nationalists.” – NDP Chair Jane Kleeb
“There is one less white supremacist in the White House, but that doesn’t change the man sitting behind the Resolute desk. Donald Trump has spent decades fueling hate in communities, including his recent attempts to divide our country and give a voice to white supremacists. We need leaders who represent all of us and the diversity of our country. We must continue to rise and organize in order to bring about change. That is why Democrats will continue to show leadership and unify our country during this deeply troubling time.” – DNC Press Secretary Michael Tyler
Trump’s Very Long History of Racism:
1969: A black family in Cincinnati sues the Trump family for discriminating against them at a housing complex that was managed by Donald Trump. The Trump employee who managed the complex on site allegedly told the plaintiff that he would never get an apartment, and called a housing organization representative a “n—– lover.” Donald Trump would later describe the employee as a “fabulous man” and an “amazing manager” in his first book.
1973: The Department of Justice files a lawsuit against Trump Management, founded by Fred Trump and run at the time by Donald Trump, for discriminating against minorities at 39 buildings in New York and Virginia. The DOJ alleged that Trump’s company would inform black renters that apartments were not available when there were in fact vacancies and that staffers were instructed to use codes – like the letter “C” for “colored” – in order to determine if an application belonged to a black potential renter so it could be rejected.
1975: After a legal battle in which Donald Trump countersued the U.S. government complaining that his company was being forced to rent to welfare recipients, the Trumps reach a historic settlement with the DOJ in which they promised not to discriminate against minority renters.
1978: Just three years after reaching a settlement with the DOJ, the government accuses the Trumps of violating the terms of the agreement, citing numerous examples of the Trumps continuing to deny apartments to minorities and steering minority renters to specific properties.
1982: Trump’s companies are once again sued for discriminating against African-Americans in a suit alleging that minority renters were turned away from properties with vacancies immediately before white applicants were told that apartments were available. In defending themselves, lawyers for Trump and the co-defendants made a series of demeaning and racially-charged arguments, including characterizing the plaintiffs as ignorant, lacking honesty and integrity, and even attempted to make an issue out of one plaintiff’s fathering of illegitimate children. In one exchange, Trump’s own lawyer questioned an African-American plaintiff about whether he had ever been involved in a “black or militant movement.” After losing an effort to have the judge reject the group as a class, the co-defendants settled the suit in 1984.
1980s: According to a former Trump casino employee, “When Donald and Ivana came to the casino, the bosses would order all the black people off the floor. … They put us all in the back.”
1989: Trump wades into the “Central Park 5” crisis by paying for a racially-provocative newspaper ad warning of “roving bands of wild criminals” and making a series of racially-charged and incendiary comments about suspects in the case, who are later exonerated.
1989: During an interview, Trump says ”a well-educated black has a tremendous advantage over a well-educated white in terms of the job market. I think sometimes a black may think they don’t have an advantage or this and that…I’ve said on one occasion, even about myself, if I were starting off today, I would love to be a well-educated black, because I believe they do have an actual advantage.”
1990: Trump responds to reports that he keeps a book of Adolf Hitler’s speeches by his bed by confirming that he has the book but insisting it was sent by “a man who I think is Jewish” and threatening to sue the outlet that reported the story.
1991: Trump was fined $200,000 after one of his casinos repeatedly moved minority and female dealers off of the casino floor to accommodate a racist high roller who was reportedly a Trump friend.
1991: Trump is accused of making racial slurs against black people in a book written by a former president of his casino company, who wrote that Trump had once complained: “black guys counting my money! I hate it. The only kind of people I want counting my money are short guys that wear yarmulkes every day.”
1993: In stunning testimony before a U.S. Congressional committee, Trump makes a series of racist comments about Native Americans while making his case against Native American casinos, including the accusation that “obvious that organized crime is rampant” on Native American reservations and claims chiefs were condoning it.
1997: Reviving his attacks on Native American casinos, Trump tells an interview that the U.S. only owes Native Americans something “if they’re real Indians…I mean, you have to check and see whether or not they’re real Indians…I made a statement, they don’t look like Indians to me.”
2000: As part of his ongoing campaign against Native American casinos, Trump secretly finances a series of newspaper advertisements in upstate New York that accused a Native American tribe of being involved in criminal activity. One advertisement suggests that the tribe is involved in drug trafficking.
2005: Trump floats a race war version of ‘The Apprentice,’ pitting an “assortment” of blacks “against whites.”
2011: Trump begins peddling doubts that Obama was born in the United States and suggests Obama may not be releasing his birth certificate because “where it says ‘religion,’ it might have ‘Muslim.’ And if you’re a Muslim, you don’t change your religion.”
2011: Trump says there is “absolutely” A ‘Muslim problem’ in the world, adding that “I don’t notice Swedish people knocking down the World Trade Center.”
2012: After President Obama produced his long-form birth certificate, Trump tweets that an “’extremely credible source’ has called my office and told me that @barackobama’s birth certificate is a fraud.”
2013: Trump outlines a racially–charged immigration platform in a speech to the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), telling the crowd that the U.S. should open its borders more for European immigrants – “people whose sons went to Harvard.”
2013: Trump tweets that the “overwhelming amount of violent crimes in our major cities is committed by blacks and hispanics.”
2013: Trump continues casting doubt on the legitimacy of the Obama presidency, telling an interviewer he has “no idea” whether Obama was born in the United States and that “nobody knows” whether his birth certificate was real.
June 2015: Trump launches his presidential campaign with a speech in which he labeled Mexican immigrants as criminals, rapists, and drug smugglers.
July 2015: Trump doubles down on his statements about Mexican immigrants amid a torrent of criticism, adding that “tremendous infectious disease is pouring across the border.”
Aug. 2015: Trump responds to a question about white supremacists’ support for him by saying “a lot of people like me.”
Oct. 2015: Trump quotes a tweet that says “I cannot believe the increase in illegals here in San Antonio Texas. We are the minority constantly discriminated against.”
Nov. 2015: Trump says a Black Lives Matter protester who interrupted one of his rallies was “so obnoxious and so loud” that “maybe he should have been roughed up.”
Nov. 2015: Trump retweets inaccurate crime statistics that appeared to originate from a Neo-Nazi Twitter user claiming blacks were responsible for the vast majority of killings.
Dec. 2015: Trump invokes a series of stereotypes about Jews during a speech to the Republican Jewish Coalition, making comments about the audience’s negotiating skills and money.
Dec. 2015: Trump proposes a “total complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States,” citing polling he said showed “great hatred towards Americans by large segments of the Muslim populations.” The next day, Trump defends his proposal by citing the internment of Japanese, German and Italian Americans during World War II.
Jan. 2016: Trump retweets a Jeb Bush insult from a Twitter user named @whitegenocideTM.
Feb. 2016: Trump refuses to condemn David Duke and the KKK four times during an interview, falsely claiming he doesn’t “know anything about David Duke.”
Feb. 2016: Trump’s campaign credentials an “unapologetically pro-white” radio show host for its rally in Tennessee, and Trump’s eldest son, Donald Jr., gives the host a 20-minute interview.
Mar. 2016: Trump says he thinks “Islam hates us…there is something there that is a tremendous hatred there.”
Apr. 2016: Trump retweets a Twitter user who wrote for an online publication covering “white nationalism and genocide.”
May 2016: Trump says “I don’t have a message” for his supporters who sent Anti-Semitic death threats to a reporter, adding that “there’s nothing more dishonest than the media.”
May 2016: Trump tweets out a picture of himself eating a taco bowl with the caption “I love hispanics!”
May 2016: The Trump campaign selects a prominent White Nationalist as a delegate in the California presidential primary.
June 2016: Trump begins a series of attacks on the Mexican heritage of the judge in his Trump University lawsuits, claiming he has an “absolute conflict.”
June 2016: Trump points to a black supporter at one of his rallies and says “look at my African-American over here.”
July 2016: Trump retweets a Star of David meme of Hillary Clinton that was originally found on a Neo-Nazi internet message board.
July 2016: Trump says racial profiling is “common sense” and was becoming “more and more necessary.”
July 2016: Trump leaves open the possibility of supporting David Duke’s U.S. Senate candidacy “depending on who the Democrat” is running against him.
July 2016: Trump launches a series of racially-charged attacks on the Khans, the family of a fallen Muslim U.S. soldier, suggesting at one point that the soldier’s mother “had nothing to say… maybe she wasn’t allowed to have anything to say.”
Aug. 2016: Trump hires Steve Bannon to be his campaign’s CEO. Bannon had spent years transforming the conservative outlet Breitbart into what he termed “the platform for the alt-right.”
Sept. 2016: Trump calls for profiling refugees and immigrants “from that part of the world” after attacks in New Jersey, New York, and Minnesota.
Sept. 2016: Trump continues to refuse to say whether he believes Obama was born in the United States.
Oct. 2016: Trump refuses to acknowledge the innocence of the Central Park 5 even after their exoneration two years earlier.
Oct. 2016: Trump delivers a speech in Florida that draws comparisons to Hitler’s rhetoric and the anti-Semitic tract “Protocols of the Elders of Zion.”
Nov. 2016: Trump’s campaign releases a “closing argument” video that employs a series of blatant anti-Semitic themes, including warnings about control of the levers of power in Washington while images of prominent Jews like George Soros and Janet Yellen flash on the screen.
Jan. 2017: Trump signs an Executive Order banning citizens of seven majority-Muslim countries from entering the United States, making good on his Muslim ban proposal within a week of taking office.
Jan. 2017: Trump’s statement marking International Holocaust Remembrance Day made no mention of the millions of Jewish people killed during the Holocaust or the anti-Semitism that led to the killings.
Feb. 2017: Trump blames his political opponents for writing racist and anti-Semitic signs to frame his supporters.
Feb. 2017: Trump questions who was really behind a spate of anti-Semitic threats, and suggested they may have been perpetuated by the left.
May 2017: Trump creates a commission to investigate alleged “voter fraud” as thinly disguised attempt to justify voter suppression in minority communities.
June 2017: Trump tweets a GIF of him attacking wrestler superimposed with CNN’s logo, which originally came from a Reddit user whose other posts included racist and anti-Semitic imagery.
Aug. 12, 2017: Trump responds to the Charlottesville crisis by condemning hatred and violence “on many sides,” refusing to specifically call out and assign blame to white supremacists and neo-Nazis.
Aug. 14, 2017: Trump condemns hate groups by name after three days of intense pressure from both parties.
Aug. 15, 2017: Trump doubles down on his original position that white supremacists and those who oppose them are equally to blame for the tragedy in Charlottesville, at one point calling some of those who attended the white supremacists rally “very fine people.”