“Black Vote, Black Power,” a collaboration between Keith Boykin and Word In Black,
examines the issues and what’s at stake for Black America
Not since the 1960s have Black Americans been the target of a greater political assault than the one we’re witnessing right now.
Donald Trump just installed a white supremacist at the State Department who openly acknowledged his belief that “white men must be in charge” of everything.
He put in another at the Treasury Department, who called to repeal the Civil Rights Act, “normalize Indian hate,” and eliminate Gaza, while bragging, “I was racist before it was cool.”
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He put an unqualified Fox News host in charge of the entire Defense Department, even after the man was flagged by a service member as an “insider threat” and a possible white supremacist.
He’s installing a man to run the Department of Health and Human Services who believes that Black people should not be given the same vaccines as white people.
And he gave unprecedented government access to an unelected white South African billionaire who performs Nazi salutes, tells far-right Germans to let go of their Hitler guilt, and is coercing Black leaders in South Africa because he thinks white people are being persecuted.
Racism is not a bug in Trump’s vision of America, it is a feature, and the racists are not trying to hide it. Just since Inauguration Day, we’ve seen white supremacists on the subway in Washington, DC., Patriot Front members at the Jefferson Memorial, and “Proud Boys” marching through the streets of the capital. And now a right-wing group has published the names and photos of mostly Black federal workers in an alarming new “DEI watchlist” that effectively puts a target on their backs.
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These are the people Donald Trump is empowering.
Trump’s mission is to dismantle decades, if not centuries, of civil rights progress in government, business, academia, and culture.
In government, he’s rescinding executive orders that have protected Black people since the 1960s and trying to eliminate the constitutional protection of birthright citizenship from the 1860s.
In business, he’s pressuring companies to end their diversity, equity, and inclusion programs, and far too many are willingly responding with “anticipatory obedience.”
In academia, he’s threatening to investigate colleges and universities with DEI programs and withhold federal funding for schools that promote racial justice, and now Rutgers University has canceled an HBCU conference and Harvard has laid off the staff of its Slavery Remembrance Program.
And in the culture, even the NFL removed its “End Racism” sign at the Super Bowl, the first time since 2021 without the message in the end zone, although the league unconvincingly denied that it was connected to Trump’s attendance at the game.
It’s hard not to reach the conclusion that white America would rather enable a destructive fascist to ruin the country than relinquish its unearned white privilege.
One year ago, I wrote a book called “Why Does Everything Have to Be About Race?” that warned about 5 features of modern racism: (1) erasing Black history, (2) centering white victimhood, (3) denying Black oppression, (4) promoting myths of Black inferiority, and (5) rebranding racism. Trump is doing all five in his first month in office.
His Defense Department banned Black History Month events and removed a video about the Tuskegee Airmen, while the Veterans Affairs office told a Black official not to mention DEI during an MLK event, all of which erase Black history.
His sweeping pardons for hundreds of January 6 insurrectionists, lesser known pardons for two white police officers who murdered a Black man, and his campaign to bring back Confederate names on military bases all center a racist misperception of white victimhood.
His rescission of decades-old civil rights executive orders fuels right-wing denial of Black oppression.
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His reckless attack on DEI immediately after the DC plane crash promotes discriminatory myths of Black inferiority.
And his coded language gaslighting us about “meritocracy,” from a man who was the first president elected with no experience in government or military and then became the first criminal to be elected, represents a stunning example of rebranding racism.
So why isn’t anybody stopping him? How is he getting away with this?
Because Trump’s Republican Party now controls all three branches of government. The executive branch is run by Trump and his minions. Both houses of Congress, the legislative branch, are controlled by Republicans. And six of the nine members of the Supreme Court, the leaders of the judicial branch, were appointed by Republican presidents.
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This is why many of us have been screaming for years that elections have consequences, and when we don’t vote in all federal, state, and local elections, we lose.
But as a Black American, it’s hard not to reach the conclusion that white America would rather enable a destructive fascist to ruin the country than relinquish its unearned white privilege. The majority of white voters supported Donald Trump in all three of his presidential campaigns. Black people did not.
We and the Indigenous have been the conscience of the country since the founding of the republic, but we are not the majority. We’ve done our job and will continue to fight for justice, but now it’s time — in fact, it’s well past time — for white people to put up or shut up about democracy.
Keith Boykin is a New York Times–bestselling author, TV and film producer, and former CNN political commentator. A graduate of Dartmouth College and Harvard Law School, Keith served in the White House, cofounded the National Black Justice Coalition, cohosted the BET talk show My Two Cents, and taught at the Institute for Research in African-American Studies at Columbia University in New York. He’s a Lambda Literary Award-winning author and editor of seven books. He lives in Los Angeles.
The post The Plot to Assassinate Black America appeared first on Word In Black.
Source: Seattle Medium
