Donald J. Trump: Dean of Division

Once you put information in cyberspace or put it in a book, there is a good chance that it will be there for posterity. Future generations will be able to view Trump’s actions and hear his words well into the future. In earlier articles I mentioned Charlottesville, the Central Park Five, Trump’s DACA reneging, his inciting followers to violence, his denunciation of the Hispanic judge, the Matt Lauer interview, and the Billy Bush interview. To me, these issues (and more) help define Trump as a politician who does a lot to divide us rather than unite us. I call him, the Dean of Division.

A lot of who we are is formed in childhood. I recently ran across an article where someone had interviewed an elderly woman who taught Sunday school to Trump’s sister about sixty years ago. When she was asked how Donald was back then, she replied that he was just as “egotistical and arrogant as he is now”. She also said that he “teased and bullied” other kids. This confirms what I heard from one of his biographers on television some time ago. I can easily see Donald as the type of child we’ve all known over the years. You know-the type of child that throws a spitball at the teacher then folds his arms and acts innocent while the other kids take the blame. I see him as the boy bully who whacks a foul ball on the kids’ baseball field and calls it a home run, when everyone knows better, but they let Donald have his way.  Donald probably never wanted to fit into that confined world where all the kids play together with the same rules applying to everyone. I see Donald as always playing outside of the rules of the game or perhaps making the rules to benefit him.  I don’t see Donald’s selfish nature starting in adulthood. It’s more likely that it started way back in childhood.

In adulthood, Donald went into the family business. Some of his employees would comment that Donald had a management style centering on “division”.  He would devise and employ strategies designed to divide his employees-one against the other, but he would call it “competition”. Trump seemed to enjoy the chaos of division in his business, and I’m sure many found their way to Trump to “tattle” on each other behind closed doors.

This divisive and chaotic mind-set accompanied Trump to the White House, where he demonstrates these characteristics daily.

Before ascending to the White House, Donald was instrumental in settling a housing discrimination lawsuit which resulted from the family business refusing to accept minority applicants as tenants in his more exclusive apartment buildings. In effect, the Trump Organization actually selected the buildings in which minority applicants were allowed to rent. Many minority applicants qualified for rentals in his high-end buildings by each-and-every measure but race. However, it was because of race alone that they were denied occupancy in these prized Trump buildings. The Trump Organization clearly divided potential renters into two groups-the whites who could rent apartments in the “prestige” buildings, and the blacks and minorities who could not!

The Central Park Five were a group of four African-American teens and one Hispanic teen, who were accused (among other charges) of assaulting, raping and sodomizing a 28-year-old white woman in New York City’s Central Park on April, 19, 1989, per Wikipedia. Though the rape kit didn’t implicate any of the suspects, following a trial based on what has been said to be the “coerced” confessions of the youths, they were tried, convicted, and incarcerated for the alleged crimes in 1990.

In 2002, Mr. Matias Reyes, a convicted murderer and rapist (already serving a life sentence in jail) confessed to the crimes against the jogger, Trisha Meili.  DNA and other corroborating evidence proved that, Reyes was, without a doubt, the perpetrator. The CP-5 convictions were vacated in 2002, but by then they had already served between 6 and 13 years in prison.  According to Wikipedia, after suing the City of New York for emotional distress, malicious prosecution, and racial discrimination in 2003, the men were awarded a somewhat delayed settlement of 41 million dollars in 2014

Trump was the most prominent opponent of the CP-5 from the start. According to NBC News, Trump insisted on the guilt of the CP-5 from the onset in 1989, to at least 2016, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary.  At the time of the crime (and because of the crime) Trump took out full-page ads in all four of the city’s key newspapers, requesting that the death penalty be reinstated in New York. Whenever Trump develops a viewpoint he usually doesn’t deviate from it. To my knowledge, to date, he has not changed his view about the guilt of the CP-5.  Trump has a long and verifiable history of taking uncompromising and divisive positions on serious issues involving race.

Over the past year, Donald Trump has created an issue out of NFL players not standing for the national anthem. He campaigned against the protests as being anti-American.  However, the players were really protesting the unfair treatment of African-Americans (and other minorities) across the nation-especially as it pertained to local police forces.  The players’ intent was never to disrespect the nation or it’s military. In fact, the movement was started by Kaepernick sitting on a bench during the anthem.  He was hardly noticed by the public. However, NFL player and former Army Green Beret, Nate Boyer (a white man), advised Colin Kaepernick that taking a knee would be more respectful than sitting during the anthem. Boyer felt that sitting during the anthem could be viewed by some as being generally disrespectful.  While being careful to not criticize Kaepernick for the reasons behind his protest, Boyer told Kaepernick how the flag is presented to family members of their deceased military relatives. The military presenters kneel, that is, take a knee out of respect for the deceased and their family as they extend the flag to the grieving family members. This is the real story behind “taking a knee” and it has nothing to do with the “lack of respect” notion that Trump repeatedly tried to market to the public at every opportunity. When this type of negative rhetoric is fed to the public, it infuriates many of them and causes division in our society because it looks to them as if well-paid and successful African-Americans are denigrating our flag, our military, and our country.  Many people knew that Trump’s protest attacks were based on false premises, but many other Americans saw the protests in the Trump-inspired negative light. Perhaps that’s the very perception that Trump wanted to plant in the minds of many.

It appears that whenever there’s a chance to drive a wedge between the American people, Mr. Trump seems to always appear on the scene to fully exploit the situation like a hungry ambulance chaser. Consider Charlottesville. Here he divided the nation by equating peaceful protesters standing for equality to torch carrying neo-Nazi types defiantly shouting “Jews will not replace us!”  Trump must stop his divisive rhetoric and actions.

Judge Gonzalo Curiel was set to preside over The Trump University fraud lawsuit, but Trump felt he should have been disqualified to preside over the lawsuit because of his Mexican heritage. This suggestion was racist in nature, divisive, and improper. Not only was Judge Curiel born and raised in the USA, he was imminently qualified to preside over that case. With good cause, the Hispanic community was incensed about this.

In the Lauer/Trump interview in New York City on September 7, 2016, Trump stated that President Barack Obama had committed terrible acts against people like Putin has been accused of. Here Trump equated the actions of a well-respected sitting American president with the totalitarian deeds of a man who is known to have imprisoned and killed political rivals and journalists. This was indeed divisive rhetoric designed to denigrate a sitting American head-of-state. It should never have happened!

Hispanics were hoping-against-hope that Trump would do the right thing concerning DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals). However he did not follow through. Consider this segment from my article entitled “Trump: Showman and Master of Deceit”. It states, “Particularly interesting is his “DACA” meeting with members of congress seated all around him.  At the meeting (with cameras all around) he professed a genuine interest in getting a DACA deal done. Days later, when the cameras were gone, he reversed course, and did nothing. This is who Donald Trump really is as seen by those of us who are not his ardent supporters and enablers.” This is the type of action, or non-action, that further divides the country clearly based on us (Trump supporters) against them (DACA) supporters. The USA has historically turned a blind eye to illegal immigration, especially as it pertained to immigrants from Hispanic countries. Their labor has been generally cheap, and many U.S. businesses needed (and still needs) the types of labor provided by these immigrants.  With reference to DACA, Trump is essentially dividing the country and furthering anti-Hispanic racism. He is known to have called Hispanics criminals, rapists, and slackers who drain our welfare system. Therefore, he feels that we should deport illegal immigrants, and build a wall on the southern border to keep them out. Let’s face it.  These people are pawns in Trump’s end-game of further dividing this country along racial lines for his own devious political gain.

The Billy Bush/Trump Access Hollywood Tape recorded in 2005 (and reemerging during the 2016 presidential campaign) highlighted Trump talking graphically about his aggressive sexual maneuverings more appropriate to a red-light district than a prime time television segment. If anything, it showed Trump’s disrespect for women by revealing that he viewed them as basically objects to satisfy his various sexual whims. This tape divided the two men into two camps-the privileged and the unprivileged. For a lesser transgression, Billy Bush lost his job. For much more serious transgressions, Trump ascended to the U.S. presidency, the highest, most prestigious job in the world. Go figure!

Some of the most blatant attempts of division along racial lines became apparent at many of Trump’s campaign rallies where he encouraged supporters to literally assault dissenters, and promised that he’ll pay their legal bills!. He said it wasn’t like this in “the old days”-a semi veiled attempt to have supporters recall the abominable “brighter days” of long ago when white privilege reigned supreme. Again, this constant rhetoric of division must stop. Whenever necessary, we must challenge Trump to explain what he means-explicitly, rather than through code words, coded messages, and brainwashed emissaries. 

Mr. Trump, America has grown tired of you.  Each day we seem to be embroiled in another avoidable Trump-inspired mess! Stop trying to divide us at every opportunity! Please recall that the majority of Americans did not vote for you. Will you change now, or will you remain America’s Dean of Division?