Trump backs violent white supremacists. There’s no way around it.
After an outcry that was joined by a few Republican lawmakers, including Sen. Tim Scott (S.C.), the lone Black Republican in the Senate, Trump attempted a partial cleanup on Wednesday. While he continued to dodge attempts to get him to denounce white supremacists, he suggested the Proud Boys “have to stand down” while claiming “I don’t know who the Proud Boys are. I mean, you’ll have to give me a definition.”
The Proud Boys were in Kenosha, Wis., fomenting violence at the time militia activist Kyle Rittenhouse, now lionized by the Proud Boys, allegedly shot and killed two racial-justice demonstrators.
The Proud Boys were instigating more violence in Portland, Ore., with paintballs, bear mace and clubs when a member of a related group (and Proud Boys supporter) was shot and killed — and in martyrdom became a hero to the Proud Boys.
Proud Boys members have been convicted of assault, attempted assault and attempted gang assault, charged with murder, indicted for rioting and accused of beating journalists and nonviolent demonstrators alike. They have coordinated rallies with neo-Nazis and ultranationalist skinheads.
Their founder, launching the group in 2016, warned enemies: “We will kill you. That’s the Proud Boys in a nutshell. We will kill you.”
As the Anti-Defamation League and the Southern Poverty Law Center have documented, the group’s occasional disavowals of racism, neo-Nazism and violence have been contradicted by countless videos, photographs, members’ rap sheets and their postings on social media, where Proud Boys figures have been banned from mainstream platforms.
“What was so alarming is this was a layup,” ADL chief executive Jonathan Greenblatt said of the request of Trump to condemn white supremacists. “The president didn’t just miss the layup. We found out he’s playing for the other team.”
Greenblatt told me that we have to “acknowledge it wasn’t an accident. It was an admission of where he stands. That’s deeply disturbing, and we don’t have a precedent for it in modern times” other than Trump’s infamous remark about “very fine people on both sides” in Charlottesville.
“Employing militias, scapegoating minorities — these tactics are not just troubling, they’re terrifying,” Greenblatt said, describing the Proud Boys as “very dangerous.”
And what do Republican leaders say of Trump’s latest refusal to denounce white supremacists and militias and his message to the Proud Boys to “stand by”?
But other Republican senators in key races leaped to Trump’s defense. Thom Tillis (N.C.) said he “believes” Trump condemns white nationalism. David Perdue (Ga.) decried “this false narrative.” Others — including John Cornyn (Tex.), Steve Daines (Mont.), Joni Ernst (Iowa) and Kelly Loeffler (Ga.) — didn’t respond when I asked their campaigns for comment. Same with the Republican Jewish Coalition. (The group tweeted past Trump remarks on racism, skipping the “very fine people” bit.)
The president sends a collaborative signal to a violent hate group in a nationally televised debate — and they are silent?
Perhaps they’re joining Roger Stone, Sean Hannity and now the president in extending a welcome mat to the Proud Boys. Trump has been retweeting, hosting and otherwise promoting figures, themes and imagery from the alt-right for years. His partial retreat on Wednesday, to an audience far smaller than the one that heard his grotesque statements on Tuesday, won’t dull the victory he gave them.
On their alternative platforms, Proud Boys members continued Wednesday basking in Trump’s embrace and celebrating his new slogan for them, “Stand back and stand by,” as a merchandising and recruiting opportunity. Wrote one of the group’s leaders: “That’s my President!”
I can’t argue.
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