Trump woos black community amid protests

WASHINGTON— President Donald Trump is offering himself as a leader who can restore law and order and reform the use of force, as American cities face protests sparked by the deaths of black suspects at the hands of police.

“I’ve done more in less than 4 years than (former Vice President Joe) Biden’s done in more than 40 years, including for Black America,” Trump tweeted Monday morning.

I’ve done more in less than 4 years than Biden’s done in more than 40 years, including for Black America. Biden has been a part of every failed decision for decades. Bad Trade Deals, Endless Wars, you name it, he has shown a complete lack of leadership. He’s weak & shot!!!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 15, 2020

Trump’s bravado may not seem in line with Trump’s 2016 record: Trump won 8 percent of the black vote in 2016 after he appealed to African Americans to support him because, as he said, “What have you got to lose?”

In 2019, Trump declared himself to be “the least racist person” in the world.

Nonetheless, a Washington Post-Ipsos poll taken in January found eight in 10 African Americans thought Trump is racist and 90 percent disapproved of his job performance.

Undaunted, Trump and his re-election team argue Trump can draw an appreciably higher percentage of black voters toward the GOP largely because of the lowest unemployment figures for black Americans in nearly 50 years, Trump’s signature achievements in the area of federal criminal justice reform and his personal ties with black celebrities.

Juneteenth controversy

Trump’s push to boost his share of the black vote hit a bump last week when the campaign scheduled a campaign rally on June 19, or Juneteenth — the national day of observance for the end of slavery — in Tulsa, Oklahoma. That city was the scene of the brutal 1921 murders of African Americans in what was known as America’s Black Wall Street.

Democrats framed the date and time as “tone deaf” to racial sensitivities already tested by the killings of George Floyd in Minneapolis and Rayshard Brooks in Atlanta.

In a change from habit, Trump heeded the advice of supporters who suggested that he move the date for his first massive rally since mid-March, when the White House recommended that Americans stay home to slow the spread of the coronavirus.

“Many of my African American friends and supporters have reached out to suggest that we consider changing the date out of respect for this Holiday, and in observance of this important occasion and all that it represents,” Trump tweeted Friday, as he announced he would headline the rally on June 27 instead.

Unconventional support

Biden has pledged to pick a female running mate, and many Democrats have pressed former President Barack Obama’s wingman to choose a black woman to complete the ticket.

While Mike Pence is white, Trump can point to support from black Americans traditionally not associated with the GOP, such as Alice Marie Johnson, a grandmother serving life without parole for a nonviolent drug offense, whose sentence Trump commuted in 2018 at the urging of reality TV star Kim Kardashian.

During the Super Bowl, the Trump campaign ran an ad that showed a newly freed Johnson thanking Trump for her release. “Politicians talk about criminal justice reform. President Trump got it done,” read the ad, showing a photo of Trump displaying his signature on the First Step Act, which reformed federal sentencing and allowed for the early release of thousands of federal inmates.

While his administration has rejected the notion that U.S. police departments are systematically racist, Trump told Fox News’ Harris Faulkner that he thought the killing of Floyd was “revolting.”

In the same interview last week, Faulkner, who is African American pressed Trump for tweeting as protests turned violent, “when the looting starts, the shooting starts.” She said that’s a phrase that sent a chills down the spines of black Americans when a Miami police chief used it in 1967.

Trump responded that he thought former Philadelphia Police Chief Frank Rizzo had uttered the phrase.

New executive order

Since Floyd’s killing, Trump has positioned himself as an advocate for local police. He has weighed various measures to reform the use of force by local police. But he rejects the Black Lives Matter slogan, Defund the Police, which Trump believes to be poison for Democrats running in November.

On Tuesday, Trump is set to sign an executive order that would focus “on bringing the police and the community together” by checking consent decrees that “disincentivize police from going into high crime areas,” a senior administration official told reporters.

The focus on public safety, the official said, should reduce “bad interactions” between the police and public.

Such rhetoric, and Trump’s decision to reschedule the Tulsa event, does represent a change in tone from Trump’s inaugural address in which he pledged, “The American carnage stops here and stops right now.”

Jamelle Bouie wrote in Slate: “This isn’t demonization for its own sake; it’s central to the president’s larger political vision, a white identity politics that looks with skepticism and hostility toward claims of racial injustice.”

A Monmouth University poll found that when it comes to addressing race relations, just more than half of respondents have confidence in Biden on the subject, with 29 percent having none at all. Asked about Trump, 40 percent had confidence in Trump’s ability to deal with the issue, but 50 percent answered “none at all.”

Contact Debra J. Saunders at dsaunders@reviewjournal.com or 202-662-7391. Follow @DebraJSaunders on Twitter.