The farce, the embarrassment and the humiliation of Donald Trump’s presidency was captured in a surreal moment Friday in which the president, as one of the many obligatory functions of his office, signed a proclamation honoring Martin Luther King Jr.
Since 1983, every president has signed the proclamation commemorating the civil rights leader’s birthday, Jan. 15, as a federal holiday. The holiday is observed on the third Monday of January each year.
In signing the proclamation, the president mouthed words from a prepared text, to include noting that love was the foundation of the civil rights leader’s greatness.
“That is what Dr. King preached all of his life, love for each other, for neighbors and for our fellow Americans,” he said.
“Dr. King’s faith and his love for humanity led him and so many other heroes to courageously stand up for civil rights of Africans-Americans. Through his bravery and sacrifice, Dr. King opened the eyes and lifted the conscience of our nation. He stirred the hearts of our people to recognize the dignity written in every human soul.”
But his words were meant to distract from Mr. Trump's true nature, which was revealed for the umpteenth time when, only a day before the signing and in the presence of several members of Congress, he allegedly referred to Haiti and some African nations as “shitholes.”
According to Sen. Richard Durbin of Illinois, who was among those in the room with the president at the time, Mr. Trump said “things which were hate-filled, vile and racist” in a harangue against the Temporary Protected Status offered to immigrants from countries suffering from natural disasters and political upheavals.
The president’s alleged comment makes it more difficult every day to dispute what I and many others believe to be true: that we have a racist as president.
I cannot recount here the entire litany of things the president has said and done, or has reportedly said and done, to substantiate this conclusion.
But among them are: He spent years fomenting the conspiracy that former President Barack Obama was not born here. He called for the banning of all Muslims from the U.S. “until we find out what the hell is going on.” He has branded Mexican immigrants “rapists” and criminals.
In a December article in The New York Times, it was reported that at a June meeting with his staff, he decried a number of immigrants who were provided visas to enter the country in 2017.
According to the Times, noting that 15,000 Haitians had secured visas, the president said they “all have AIDS.” Referring to the 40,000 Nigerians with visas, he said that once they have seen the United States they would never “go back to their huts” in Africa, the Times reported.
That was the farce.
The embarrassment was provided by Ben Carson, the former celebrity neurosurgeon, who Trump made secretary of Housing and Development and who has become a regular cardboard standee for the president whenever he needs to create the impression that his administration has credibility in the African-American community.
Friday was one of those occasions, with Carson standing by the president's side and crooning about civil rights and MLK's leadership, all the while giving cover to a man, who if he had the opportunity, might have denied Carson’s dream of being a neurosurgeon.
The humiliation was having to witness another member of the iconic King family, this time his nephew Isaac Newton Farris Jr., thanking the president for the farce he was committing.
“Bottom line is you are doing something to benefit someone other than yourself," he said as the best way to honor MLK on his birthday.
“So President Trump, thank you for taking the time to acknowledge this day. Thank you for remembering that we are all Americans and that on this day we should be united.”
Maybe he was just being diplomatic, but we are living in a time in which we need him to have the moral courage and outrage of his uncle. We need him to tell the president to his face that “You, sir, are antithetical to everything for which my uncle stood.”