Donald Trump, who has somehow managed to make racial politics even more central to his movement than when he launched it a decade ago, now routinely spouts rhetoric befitting a 1940s segregationist.
In an interview last week with The New York Times, the president declared that the Civil Rights Act of 1964 — which outlawed, among other things, racist discrimination — led to white people being “very badly treated.” Per the Times:
‘White people were very badly treated, where they did extremely well and they were not invited to go into a university to college,’ he said, an apparent reference to affirmative action in college admissions. ‘So I would say in that way, I think it was unfair in certain cases.’
He added: ‘I think it was also, at the same time, it accomplished some very wonderful things, but it also hurt a lot of people — people that deserve to go to a college or deserve to get a job were unable to get a job. So it was, it was a reverse discrimination.’
It’s a line of attack that one could easily imagine being uttered by the likes of avowed bigots such as George Lincoln Rockwell or George Wallace. More recently, conservatives such as the late activist Charlie Kirk have led the charge of baselessly claiming that the Civil Rights Act has facilitated anti-white discrimination.
To be clear, and contrary to Trump’s claims, white people not being granted college acceptance or getting a certain job isn’t evidence of widespread anti-white racism, though one could argue that it can amount to evidence of white entitlement. It’s also worth noting that the Civil Rights Act has protected many white Americans themselves, as it outlaws discrimination based on gender and religion, not just race. Nonetheless, Trump’s remarks come as his administration and some of the MAGA movement’s loudest voices are spewing blood-and-soil bigotry, all while the White House pushes pro-segregation policies and tries to whitewash the history of American racism.
Ja’han Jones is an MS NOW opinion blogger. He previously wrote The ReidOut Blog. 
