Former President Donald Trump, who banned Black people from his casinos in the 80s, deployed the national guard on Black Lives Matter protestors and earned the endorsement of Ku Klux Klan grand wizard David Duke, claims he isn’t racist because he has Black friends. In a sit down interview with Semafor reporter Kadia Goba, Trump reiterated the age-old racist line when asked if he was racist, he assured Goba, “I have so many Black friends.” “If I were a racist, they wouldn’t be friends, they would know better than anybody, and fast... They would not be with me for two minutes if they thought I was racist — and I’m not racist!” the former President went on. Trump added that Black people, Black men in particular, are attracted to his “strength,” adding that “they want strength, they want security. They want jobs, they want to have their jobs. They don’t want to have millions of people come and take their jobs.” Echoing another age-old trope that immigrants are stealing jobs from Black people in the inner cities.
