CounterPunch Exclusives

CounterPunch Exclusives

Strutting Out of the Woodwork: The “New” Racism, the Rise of the Trumpian Albocracy and its Collaborators

Photograph by Nathaniel St. Clair

“Calling us racist doesn’t work anymore.”  – Brandon Gill “Let them call you racist. Let them call you xenophobes. Let them call you nativist. Wear it as a badge of honor.” – Steve Bannon “Sometimes Minnesotans are so afraid that you’re going to call us a racist, you’re going to call us an Islamophobe, you’re going to call us some name that we just don’t want to get into that fight. You know what, I would argue that I never did care, but I’m done being careful, even the least bit careful.” – Tom Emmer

“Calling us racist doesn’t work anymore.”

“Let them call you racist. Let them call you xenophobes. Let them call you nativist. Wear it as a badge of honor.”

“Sometimes Minnesotans are so afraid that you’re going to call us a racist, you’re going to call us an Islamophobe, you’re going to call us some name that we just don’t want to get into that fight. You know what, I would argue that I never did care, but I’m done being careful, even the least bit careful.”

They no longer hide in the woodwork. In Donald Trump’s America, racism has become a badge of honor, worn with pride by the icy posses of the right, his deputized agents of hate, and other self-proclaimed “patriots.”

Those who decry the rise of the “new antisemitism” remain silent on the old racism, which isn’t old at all, merely less flamboyantly expressed. Today, this new variation boldly emerges from the shadows of what was once called “polite racism,” “banal racism,” or what Jared Taylor, the founder of the white nationalist American Renaissance,euphemistically touts as “race realism.” Whatever you call it, under Trump, the right’s “Hope and Change” mirror-universe Obama, racism has been normalized, as an expanding swath of white America, seeking scapegoats for the nation’s moral and economic decline, anxiously frets about the rising tide of color they fear will replace them and “their values.” The fact that among these fretters are individuals from the very groups comprising that tide, such as  Black Voices for Trump,  Latinos for Trump, and Indian Americans for Trump – should give pause, if only to recognize that racism, like other oppressive, classify-and-conquer systems, requires collaborators.

Megyn Kelly, the former Fox News and NBC News host turned meltdown podcaster, who once insisted that Jesus and Santa Claus are white, defended blackface, and raged against the New Black Panthers [1], only to issue disingenuous apologies when her racism was called out, now angrily demands that Haitians “go back to fucking Haiti.” She accuses them of being unassimilable because they have not adopted the work ethic of a country built in large part on the backs of enslaved blacks[2] as their owners exalted the virtues of liberty, equality, and the rights of white men. Although she faced another social media backlash, this time Kelly has not apologized. Immersed in the blooming rejecting pool of toxic hate that is social media, she has turned vociferous race-baiting into her brand, her disdain for black and brown people fueling her podcasting fame and profitability.

Not to be outdone, Trump has proclaimed that he does not want Somalis “in our country,” labeling them “garbage.”[3]A year ago, Trump’s supporters would have deflected by telling us that the president was simply being his usual straight-talking self or joking, though this “joke” seemed to be cribbed from comedian Tony Hinchcliffe, another unapologetic trash talker. Today, they double down. Seven years ago, Trump denied he called Haiti and African nations “shithole countries.” Now, he confirms he did. He has repeatedly told Rep. Ilhan Omar to “go back to your country,” the latest instance occurring at the rescheduled White House Correspondents’ Dinner, where – this time uninterrupted – he performed his signature vile rally material.

Trump is not alone. Representative Tom Emmer tells a predominantly white Faith and Freedom Coalition audience in Washington, D.C. that if visitors to America “don’t assimilate, then they should go the hell back to wherever they came from,” a remark welcomed with enthusiastic applause. While his immediate target is Minnesota’s Somali community, his use of “wherever” left the geographic boundary conveniently vague. His phraseology makes clear that he meant people – to borrow the president’s slur – from “shithole countries.” However, despite his self-professed “aggressive-aggressive” temperament, he fails to tell the Somalis this to their faces.

Immigrants and refugees of color stand accused of rejecting Christian American values. In keeping with the conference, Emmer presents himself as a defender of those values, though judging by his statements, he seems unfamiliar with Luke 10:30-37 and Luke 17:11-19, biblical passages in which despised Samaritans prove more compassionate than their detractors. More disturbingly, and contrary to Luke’s teachings, Emmer’s remarks suggest he believes his faith allows him to reject modern-day Samaritans, regardless of their actions, simply because they........

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