On Sunday, Utah Republican Senator Mitt Romney joined one of the many Black Lives Matter protest crowds in Washington, D.C. It’s stunning that the ideological commitment on the part of Republicans has reached such a fever pitch that Romney was the first to use the slogan “Black Lives Matter” — but here we are, where Congressional Republicans refuse to acknowledge the truth. At a press conference on Monday, White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany tried to make Trump sound like he’s on the side of black Americans, pointing out that he won 8 percent of black Americans’ votes in 2016. Is that supposed to make Trump sound good or well-liked? 8 percent is not a lot!
not only is weird to brag about trump only getting 8% of the black vote, @PressSec lied about mitt romney's performance with black voters and understated it https://t.co/DKNBlk4Nqs
— Oliver Willis (@owillis) June 8, 2020
McEnany mockingly commented to reporters:
‘Mitt Romney can say three words outside on Pennsylvania Avenue, but I would note this: that President Trump won 8 percent of the black vote. Mitt Romney won 2 percent of the black vote. I believe… people across the country recognize that while Mitt Romney has a lot of words — notably, he said that 47 percent of the nation is dependent upon government, believes they are victims, believes government has a responsibility to care for them. Those were Mitt Rommey’s words not too long ago. The president takes great offense to those words. That’s not America.’
Watch below:
Press Sec. Kayleigh McEnany: "Mitt Romney can say three words outside on Pennsylvania Avenue but I would note this — that President Trump won 8% of the black vote." pic.twitter.com/qlu5iFQPGg
— The Hill (@thehill) June 8, 2020
Neither 8 percent nor 2 percent are remotely positive numbers that any candidate should be proud of! And reality check: although yes, it’s true that Romney criticized “47 percent” of Americans around the time that he ran for president in 2012, it’s also true that at the time of Romney’s original comments, Trump himself insisted that the then-presidential candidate had nothing to apologize for. In other words, in reality, Trump only supports some kind of melodramatic, upstanding American morals — or whatever — when it suits him politically.
Kayleigh McEnany just said “the president takes great offense to those words. That’s not America.” Of the 47% comments.
McEnany statement’s was wrong. https://t.co/fborlWdGcT
— andrew kaczynski🤔 (@KFILE) June 8, 2020
McEnany should just not be taken seriously at this point. She is obviously not a serious White House press secretary — she’s a propagandist. Nowhere in her remarks did she actually directly answer the initial question, which was whether or not the president agrees with the core message of the Black Lives Matter movement. That core message, of course, is that black lives matter. Why is it so difficult for Trump and other Republicans to make that simple acknowledgement?
.@MittRomney is marching with a group of nearly 1,000 Christians to the White House. Here he is on video saying why he’s walking: “… to make sure that people understand that Black Lives Matter” https://t.co/KCxJNchCMs pic.twitter.com/Za0Am2WL8g
— Hannah Natanson (@hannah_natanson) June 7, 2020
On Monday, Trump’s focus has been with his public image — like it is every other day of his life. After CNN unveiled a poll that showed presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden with a whopping 55 percent of the support, Trump melted down. He tweeted:
‘CNN Polls are as Fake as their Reporting. Same numbers, and worse, against Crooked Hillary. The Dems would destroy America! The Lamestream Media refuses to talk about our Country’s record setting Jobs Numbers, which are indicating GREATNESS, and soon!’
While Americans continue to reel from the Coronavirus pandemic and grapple with other major issues like police brutality and ensuing protests, these are the president’s priorities: poll numbers. He’s a useless excuse for a president, in other words, and America voting him out of office this November would be a great day for the country.
The president is so focused on polls that he has now hired a pollster to analyze the polls of news organizations. That is his focus. That is what he's spending his time on.
— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) June 8, 2020
