Over the weekend, President Trump put his racist beliefs on full display when he lobbed attacks at four congresswomen of color: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, Rashida Tlaib of Michigan and Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts. In his appeal to white nationalists, Trump equated being a person of color to being non-American when he suggested the legislators “go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came.”
All four women are American. Ocasio-Cortez, Tlaib, and Pressley were all born in the United States and Omar is a duly naturalized citizen. Trump's attack was an unequivocal, blatant display of his racism, despite his supporters' attempt to categorize it as something else.
The president doubled down on his remarks during a press conference Monday, veiling his racism behind fabricated solidarity with the Jewish community all the while pitting Jews against people of color. As Hawaii Senator Brian Schatz pointed out on Twitter: "You really have to leave us out of your racist talking points."
The four congresswomen similarly held a press conference on Monday, in which they denounced the president's remarks and echoed calls for impeachment. In the words of Ocasio-Cortez, the president "does not know how to defend his policies, so what he does is attack us personally, and that is what this is all about."
On Monday, many began circulating the hashtag #RacistPresident to show their solidarity with the four congresswomen, and on Tuesday opponents similarly used #ObamaWasBetterAt to highlight the bigoted ineptitude of 45 by comparing him to his predecessor, President Barack Obama.
You can read some of them below.
