Trump's War on Black America Isn't an Accident--It's a Strategy

[Celerity]

Lisa Cook, Kamala Harris, Black mayors—the pattern is obvious. But the best way to attack Trump’s racism is to tie it to his other hatreds.

https://newrepublic.com/article/199993/trump-war-black-america-lisa-cook

https://archive.ph/epHg8





A recent New York Times story concluded that the number of Black women who have jobs has decreased by more than 300,000 nationally since Donald Trump took office. Black women are the only demographic group showing a dip. That article provided empirical evidence of what I and many others already perceived—this administration is harming and in some ways targeting Black people in particular. There have been countless anti-Black moves, including trying to remove Lisa Cook from the Federal Reserve Board, stripping Kamala Harris of her Secret Service protection, deploying the National Guard to cities with Black mayors and large African American populations, essentially outlawing diversity and equity initiatives.

Many liberals, including my colleague Michael Tomasky, say that the Trump administration is much more racist than its predecessors. I agree, but not in the common understanding of that word. Someone being racist is generally understood as them disliking or treating people unfairly based on their skin color or appearance. It’s possible that Trump and his aides have this kind of explicit animus toward African Americans. But in my view, what drives this administration is authoritarianism and ideological conservatism more than racial bigotry. Authoritarianism and ideological conservatism hit Black people in America really hard, and racism is a useful tool to further authoritarianism and ideological conservatism.

Let me start with ideological conservatism. Trump’s administration is arguably the most conservative in modern history, aggressively implementing goals that Republicans have long supported but didn’t follow through on, wary of political backlash. For example, Trump has drastically cut the federal workforce, particularly employees of agencies such as the Department of Education that are perceived to be more left-leaning. Under Trump, long-standing Republican wariness about affirmative action and other efforts to reverse the effects of sexism, racism, homophobia, and other forms of discrimination has turned into a comprehensive defunding of virtually any diversity and inclusion program, both inside and outside the federal government.

Ideological conservatism isn’t inherently against people with dark skin. But because of how African Americans have been discriminated against throughout American history, policies that are liberal and redistributive tend to disproportionately benefit them. In our more recent history, the federal government has made great efforts to ensure its hiring processes are transparent, fair, and inclusive of people of all backgrounds. As a result, Black people have been able to find and keep jobs in the bureaucracy more than other sectors of the economy. African Americans often embrace DEI initiatives and work in such programs because they seek to address inequities that Black people recognize.

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