President Trump said in a new Fox News interview that he’s done more for the African American community than any president.
‘I think I’ve done more for the black community than any other president,’ Trump told Fox News Channel’s Harris Faulkner in an interview that aired Friday. ‘And let’s take a pass on Abraham Lincoln, because he did good although it’s always questionable, you know, in other words, the end result.’
It was unclear, exactly, what result Trump was talking about, though Faulkner, who is black, responded, ‘Well, we are free, Mr. President. He did pretty well.’
‘We are free,’ Trump said back. ‘Well, you understand what I mean? You know, I got to take a pass on an Honest Abe, as we call it.’
Trump has defended the Confederacy and vowed to continue to honor its leaders and generals, despite calls to bring them down in wake of racial unrest.
“For all intents and purposes, Donald Trump is the Confederacy’s second president,” the Republican Lincoln Project said in a statement. “No American should celebrate traitorous Generals whose actions resulted in the deaths of 620,000+ Americans.”
The group was co-founded by conservative attorney George Conway ― husband of counselor to the president Kellyanne Conway.
Confederate statues are coming down ― some by choice, some by force ― and the Confederate flag is being removed from public view amid anti-racism protests sparked by the police killing of George Floyd.
Earlier this week, NASCAR announced the flag would no longer be allowed at its events.
The U.S. Marines and Navy have both banned the flag, and the Pentagon also said it was open to a bipartisan discussion on renaming the numerous U.S. Army bases that honor Confederate figures.
But Trump intervened and said he “will not even consider” it.
Trump had made similar comments about Lincoln previously.
On June 2, when the nation was in the throngs of the protests over George Floyd’s death, he tweeted that he came in second place after Lincoln in helping black Americans.
‘My Admin has done more for the Black Community than any President since Abraham Lincoln,’ the president tweeted. ‘Passed Opportunity Zones with Sen. Tim Scott, guaranteed funding for HBCU’s, School Choice, passed Criminal Justice Reform, lowest Black unemployment, poverty, and crime rates in history … …AND THE BEST IS YET TO COME!’
Trump also compared himself to Lincoln when he was sitting under the statue of Lincoln at the Lincoln Memorial for a Fox News Channel town hall with Brett Baier and Martha MacCallum in May.
‘Look, I am greeted with a hostile press the likes of which no president has ever seen. The closest would be that gentleman right up there,’ Trump said.
He pointed at the huge statue of Lincoln that was several feet away.
‘I believe I am treated worse,’ he said.
Despite all the chatter about Lincoln, the president of the United States who carried the Union through the Civil War, Trump this week also refused to consider renaming military bases that are still named after Confederate figures.
He argued that they were part of the country’s ‘heritage,’ while White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany said a name change would be an insult to all the Americans who served and died abroad who left those bases.
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