Donald Trump began his day with a Twitter thread attacking black and brown freshman congresswomen and telling them to go back to where they came from, which is a long-standing and common racist response to non-white people. In his final tweet of the thread, Trump mentioned Democratic Speaker Nancy Pelosi as if the two are in lockstep agreement on this matter. Pelosi was quick to fire back with a Twitter thread of her own, condemning the attack and distancing herself from Trump’s racist sentiments.
In a twist of irony, Trump’s tweets mentioned the corrupt and lawless governments in the countries the four congresswomen, Rep. Rashida Talib (D-MI), Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN), and Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-IL), came from. For three of the four, that country is the United States. He’s correct: the women come from a country with a corrupt and lawless leader. Rep. Omar was born in Somalia but immigrated to the United States at the age of 10 and became a citizen at age 17.
‘
Disagreements between progressive and more moderate Democrats is nothing new, and it’s certainly not exclusive to the left-wing members of Congress. Tea Party Republicans famously upended the entire right-wing, conservative party movement and two Republican speakers have been virtually forced out of Congress thanks to the right’s political divide.
Pelosi’s earlier comments about the freshman Democratic lawmakers were related to party unity during the 2020 elections, and Trump is not supporting or defending Pelosi with his comments. He knows exactly what he’s doing in highlighting the change agents in the Democratic Party and their attempts to reform the platform despite more moderate members’ concerns about tradition and public sentiment. What Trump is doing is undergirding the notion that Pelosi’s disagreement with these congresswomen is based on their race rather than their ideologies.
Twitter caught on quickly and were stunned by the white nationalist rhetoric still being displayed by the leader of the Republican Party. Most, however, are ready for Trump to go and urged Speaker Pelosi to begin impeachment proceedings. Read some of their comments below:
Featured image via Flickr by AFGE under a Creative Commons license
