Donald Trump is either utterly clueless about how the government works or just counts on the fact that his supporters are. In a non-stop schoolyard bully attack on Rep. Elijah Cummings, the head of the House Oversight Committee, Trump has repeatedly called the representative a “bully” who has victimized him with “oversight,” which is literally in his job description.
.@RepCummings is a champion in the Congress and the country for civil rights and economic justice, a beloved leader in Baltimore, and deeply valued colleague. We all reject racist attacks against him and support his steadfast leadership. #ElijahCummingsIsAPatriot https://t.co/2LG8AuQrHh
— Nancy Pelosi (@SpeakerPelosi) July 27, 2019
Speaker Nancy Pelosi called Trump’s attacks out for what they are: racist rhetoric against a black congressman that condemns a predeominantly black community as “filthy,” “crime-ridden,” and “rat infested.” He has yet to mention that the most impoverished states are nearly exclusively red states or that similar urban areas of poverty can be found in every state in the country.
Unlike Trump, Rep. Cummings was elected by a majority of voters in his district and has served in the House for more than 20 years. Some areas of West Baltimore, where poverty and crime rates are high, are not representative of the entire state of Maryland nor the entire district that Cummings represents. Further, Cummings is not a mayor and does not solely serve a single area of Baltimore, his district is much larger than that.
Of course, Trump has also failed to connect his 2016 presidential promises that crime and poverty would be a thing of the past for black communities under his leadership. After all, he said, what did black people have to lose with him in the White House? Only he could fix it. Now, he’s deflecting and using high poverty rates to attack a congressman who is doing the job he was elected to do. Passing the buck is one of Trump’s favorite strategies.
Twitter wasn’t buying into the rhetoric and stood behind Rep. Cummings. Read some fo their comments below:
Featured image via Flickr by Gage Skidmore under a Creative Commons license
