Trump Sparks Controversy at Black Journalists’ Convention with Kamala Harris Comments, US

Once again, Donald Trump glided down what this time was just his virtual gold-plated escalator. Once again, Trump was going to kick off a run for the presidency. Once again, he had a carefully calculated scheme for capturing the attention of the news media and the public whose minds, frankly, had begun to wander. Once again, Trump would use one of his time-tested, racially skewed attack themes that he knew would get the media focusing on him and the public talking about him. And this time he needed it more than ever because he had this surprise new opponent – Kamala Harris – who, being new, was getting way too much media buzz. And worse, way too much money. Only this time, Trump got off his virtual gilded escalator in Chicago. Because that’s where the National Association of Black Journalists was convening. They had invited him to be interviewed onstage – and that’s where Trump knew for sure that the attention he craved could be easily captured. Trump planned to deploy his time-tested attention-getting scheme that was built around his no longer secret weapon – the surefire shock value he would ignite by launching yet another race-based attack. It worked perfectly when Trump launched himself into national politics. He didn’t propose a solution to any of your problems. He just launched his totally bogus birther claims, questioning whether President Barack Obama was born in Kenya, not America. That got Trump his attention. Then he came down his golden escalator in 2015 and used another race-based attack theme to get the attention that came to be his campaign theme: that Latin American drug dealers and criminals were flooding into the United States across the border with Mexico. On Wednesday, Trump was interviewed by Black journalists and launched his re-schemed secret weapon. Trump astonished an interviewer and the entire audience by claiming that his new Democratic presidential opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris, had hidden her Black heritage – until it proved politically advantageous for her to highlight it. I didn’t know she was Black until a number of years ago when she happened to turn Black, and now she wants to be known as Black, Trump told the audience of Black journalists. So I don’t know, is she Indian or is she Black? I respect either one but she obviously doesn’t because she was Indian all the way and then all of a sudden she made a turn and she became a Black person. Trump added: I think somebody should look into that too. So of course, a world of news media fact-checkers did just that. Trump was talking, of course about a California woman whose father was from Jamaica and mother was from India. Harris chose to go to a historically Black college (Howard University in Washington, D.C.) and joined a historically Black sorority (Alpha Kappa Alpha). When she was elected California attorney general in 2010, her website called her the first African American woman and first South Asian woman in California to hold the office. And when she won, a rich guy in New York City, Donald Trump, contributed to her campaign. During the Q&A session, ABC News’ Rachel Scott noted a number of Trump’s quotes in which he had disparaged Black people, including Black prosecutors and had told four congresswomen who are racial minorities to go back to the places they came from. Then she asked: Why should Black voters trust you after you have used language like that? Trump responded that he’d never been questioned in such a horrible manner before. He also complained that her questions were rude and nasty. When he was president, Trump made similar disparaging comments about Black women reporters, including April Ryan and Yamiche Alcindor, when they asked questions he did not like. In this startup of what seems to be a contentious fall campaign, candidates traditionally follow the strategy of beginning by courting and solidifying what they figure will be their political base. And that was what happened this week. Harris chose to rally her core supporters at the national convention of a historically Black sorority, Sigma Gamma Rho in Houston. The American people deserve a leader who tells the truth, said Harris. A leader who doesn’t respond with hostility and anger when presented with the facts. We deserve a leader who understands that our differences do not divide us. They are an essential source of our strength. And Trump, as we just saw, clearly chose to rally his core supporters who, he believes, get fired up when he speaks harshly and critically to – or about – Kamala Harris and journalists. Especially Black journalists. The Republican presidential standard bearer’s fiery attack lines at the Black journalists’ convention was big news that night and all the next day. Trump must be pleased that his plan worked so well, once again.