Obama Just Called Out The Racists Who Disrespected His Presidency
In the last weeks of his presidency, President Barack Obama is speaking out about the racism that has plagued his time in office over the last eight years. Yesterday, Obama sat down with Fareed Zakaria of CNN to discuss how he has been marginalized because of his race, including the racist attacks against him by Trump and the “birther movement.”
“Are there folks whose primary concern about me has been that I seem foreign ― the other? Are those who champion the birther movement feeding off of bias?” Obama questions. “Absolutely.”
Obama also addresses how he is perceived by whites in the north versus the south; it is clear that those in the Southern states do not support him simply because of his race “I think there’s a reason attitudes about my presidency among whites in northern states are very different from whites in southern states,” Obama offers, without explicitly saying that racism is to blame – but what else could it possibly be?
Among these white racists, many have supported the birther movement, as it was a way to de-legitimize President Obama’s status as an American citizen because of the color of his skin and his background. In spite of the fact that he released his birth certificate, ignorance has largely prevailed. With Donald Trump acting as their mouthpiece, these racists have continued to question whether Obama is a “real American,” simply because he is not white.
In an interview with Meredith Vieira on the Today Show, Trump made a typical baseless claim about Obama’s birth certificate, perfect to appeal to the paranoia of the uninformed far-right, saying: “I have people that actually have been studying it and they cannot believe what they are finding,” he ambiguously warned, continuing, “If he wasn’t born in this country, then he has pulled one of the great cons in the history of politics.” This claim has absolutely no grounding because President Obama’s birth certificate was released. It is also totally ironic that the greatest conman in politics, Donald Trump, would call anyone out on a “con”.
Former Senior Advisor to President Obama, David Axelrod attests to the racism President Obama has experienced, being treated worse than any white president before him.
“It’s indisputable that there was a ferocity to the opposition and a lack of respect to him that was a function of race,” Axelrod confirms.
The supporters of the birther movement have hidden behind an idea of a birth certificate to cover their racism, but now that Trump has been elected, these feelings are out in the open. With racist attacks and events on a terrifying upsurge since Trump was elected, it is a sad situation that one of our most intelligent and qualified leaders in the history of this country has been belittled and disrespected by an ignorant and hateful white-right, who cannot see past skin color throughout his entire presidency.
Now that their ultra-conservative, unapologetically racist and uninformed candidate is in power, there’s nothing stopping us from doing everything they did to Obama, and then some, to Trump. We don’t need to claim Trump is not an American, but we know he is un-American—he is not who we want to represent us. He is a racist pig and it’s up to the Democrats to do what we can to get him out before he destroys this country from the inside out.
Watch it here:
.@POTUS to @FareedZakaria in #ObamaLegacy: Are there people whose primary concern is that I seem foreign? Absolutely https://t.co/VLBUR6m6es
— CNN (@CNN) December 8, 2016
