Whenever there’s a serious social issue raising heated conversations across the country, Donald Trump can be counted on to take the worst side. In the same week that Trump rescinded Obama-era healthcare protections for transgender Americans (and on Pride Day, no less), he has ranted about peaceful protests by professional athletes who kneel during the National Anthem to protest the disproportionate number of black Americans who experience police brutality.
To be clear, Donald Trump has never before now been any kind of soccer fan. If he won’t be watching the U.S. Women’s National Soccer team anymore, they’ll lose exactly zero points in their ratings. He has had a lot to say, however, about the NFL and the recent statement by NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell.
We, the NFL, condemn racism and the systematic oppression of Black People. We, the NFL, admit we were wrong for not listening to NFL players earlier and encourage all to speak out and peacefully protest. We, the NFL, believe Black Lives Matter. #InspireChange pic.twitter.com/ENWQP8A0sv
— NFL (@NFL) June 5, 2020
Is it a coincidence that the NFL players who began protesting by kneeling are black and the soccer team who knelt in solidarity with those players are women?
Previously, Trump has referred to Colin Kaepernick who knelt during the National Anthem, not as a protest against the flag or the anthem but about the ways in which the promises of that flag and anthem have not held true for black Americans, as a “son-of-a-b*tch” and said that “maybe he shouldn’t be in our country,” echoing the age-old taunts of white people for black Americans to “go back to Africa.”
Trump’s stance on this issue is aligned with very few Americans at this point. A Rasmussen poll, the president’s favorite pollsters, released a report this week showing that the Black Lives Matter movement is “more popular than Donald Trump,” Trump is speaking to his far-right, white, Southern base with these disparaging comments, but he doesn’t appear to be helping himself much with the average American.
Twitter was particularly critical of Trump’s Saturday rant. Read some of their comments below:
  
Featured image screenshot via YouTube
