Trump went apoplectic over protesters in the wake of the police murder of George Floyd, governors recounted in a new book.
Donald Trump became so unhinged as he railed about Black Lives Matter protesters in a 2020 conference call with state leaders that the governor of Maine feared he was having a “nervous breakdown,” according to an upcoming book.
Gov. Janet Mills even called a security guard into her office to listen to the rant, New York Times journalists Jonathan Martin and Alexander Burns reported in their book “This Will Not Pass,” a copy of which was obtained by The Hill.
“You gotta sit here and listen to this because I think the president of the United States is having a nervous breakdown or something, and it’s scary,” Mills recalled telling the guard, according to the book, which is out on Tuesday.
Oregon’s Democratic Gov. Kate Brown called her husband into her office to listen to Trump roar during the call, the book recounted. “You can’t make this crap up,” Brown said she told her husband.
Trump was furious over national protests in the wake of the police murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis, and demanded a massive crackdown.
The book “Frankly, We Did Win This Election,” by Wall Street Journal reporter Michael Bender, recounted last year that Trump and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Mark Milley went at it in a tense meeting in the Situation Room after Trump made “exaggerated claims about the violence at the protests and alarmed officials” by saying he’d put Milley in charge of quelling the protests.
In a separate Oval Office meeting, Trump told Milley that he wanted the military to “beat the “F” out of” Black Lives Matters protesters “or shoot them.” When Milley said that wasn’t possible, Trump reportedly responded: “Well, shoot them in the leg ― or maybe the foot.”
“This Will Not Pass” reported that Trump at the time derisively scoffed at calls to reschedule his upcoming political rally in Tulsa so it wouldn’t be held on Juneteenth, which marks the Emancipation Proclamation and the end of slavery in America. He didn’t appear to comprehend the significance of the date — especially in the wake of Floyd’s death.
Can you imagine “changing the day of the rally in Oklahoma to accommodate these people?” Trump asked New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy (D) during dinner at his Bedminster, New Jersey, golf club, the book recounted. “Have you ever heard of such a ridiculous thing?”
I'd expect nothing less from an unhinged white supremacist.
"I am not an American ... In my view premarital sex should be illegal" - Ajax18
Donald Trump wrote:
Can you imagine “changing the day of the rally in Oklahoma to accommodate these people?
Can't understand why the man didn't get more votes from the African-American community...
The great problem of any civilization is how to rejuvenate itself without rebarbarization.
- Will Durant "Of what meaning is the world without mind? The question cannot exist."
- Edwin Land
I don't know, Kevin, the problem is that the worst parts of episodes like these are the best parts for the typical right-winger.
I'm going out on a limb though and saying racisim isn't the key issue here.
This episode could have unfolded over any number of things. The key element is Trumps no-nonsense "regular guy" routine. The guy who's a parody of himself, having a beer and then coming unglued when the neighbor kids kick a ball over his fence. "You kids won't be laughing after I have a talk with Ron and that belt comes out of the loops!"
It's perennially important that he be this way in contrast to all the people around him who take adulthood too seriously.
The essential ingredient is his not-so-unique style of populism, not racism. But racism and all other kinds of bad -isms are sure to follow when a populist authoritarian regime holds power.
Gotta agree with the Dean here. I used to think that it was all about the racism, but I think there is a more deeply seated thuggishness that makes Trump appealing to his base. He is an abusive blue-collar dad writ large. A whole generation of people saw this as a reliable image of authority. A real taking care of business and taking no prisoners attitude. Racism is a concomitant factor, but it is so unconsciously intertwined with the thuggishness that it doesn’t even register. BLM types are bad because they cause problems for the “boys in blue,” regardless of their race. Nothing a good thumping wouldn’t take care of, in the simple thug’s mind.
“If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don’t have to worry about the answers.”~Thomas Pynchon, Gravity’s Rainbow
I think Gadianton and kishkumen have pointed out a basic reality here. Racism is happy to jump on the train but it appears some other things are driving the train.
