Trump wooing the black vote

It didn't go so well at the National Association of Black Journalists' interview.

The myth of the newer, more disciplined Trump came to an end yesterday when he lost his marbles on stage during an interview at the National Association of Black Journalists conference.

During the interview, Trump was hostile and incoherent. He lied and rambled. The interview went so poorly that his campaign ended the interview early, something that rarely happens at an in-person event. In one of his worst moments, Trump falsely questioned Vice President Harris’s racial identity. Trump gave this answer when asked whether he agreed with the Republicans who have called Harris a “DEI candidate:”

I don't know, is she Indian or is she Black? I respect either one, but she obviously doesn't, because she was Indian all the way, and then all of a sudden, she made a turn, and she went — she became a Black person … I didn't know she was Black until a number of years ago when she happened to turn Black.

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During the interview, Trump also failed to defend the January 6th rioters and his vice presidential pick. The interview was a disaster, and a long-overdue reminder of Trump’s manifest flaws as a candidate.

  Message Box News

As a human being.

While the whole New Trump thing is way overstated, it’s been a very long time since he has imploded in public like he did yesterday. Trump lost his shit for one reason — he’s scared of Kamala Harris.

The whole interview:

Some of the worst moments:

Like Nikki Haley's supporters, I guess he just doesn't need black votes.

Which is why the interview was cut way short.  It was supposed to be an hour, but the "Trump team" called it at 35 minutes.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE 11:51 am:

Trump received no pushback against his racist claims from the panel, nor was he fact-checked or challenged on any of the other lies and mistruths he spewed from the stage—including the entirely preposterous claim that Harris and the Democrats support abortions of fully alive, already-born children. Indeed, reports indicate that Trump threw some kind of temper tantrum backstage when he was informed that he would be fact-checked live by the panel, delaying his appearance for nearly an hour before the NABJ leaders pathetically relented and agreed to allow him to lie from their stage.

  Elie Mystal @ The Nation

While onstage, he claimed (more than once) that he was forced to be late because Rachel Scott didn't have the equipment in order.

Trump was always going to exploit the occasion to baselessly attack his Black woman opponent in front of a Black audience. Anybody can ask Trump a question. They can even ask him a “tough” question. But getting an answer to that question, and smacking down the lies he tells on the way to an answer, takes real journalistic skill. There are plenty of Black journalists who have those skills; Harris Faulkner (of Fox News) is not one of them. Nor was Kadia Goba (Semafor) up to the task. Rachel Scott (ABC) acquitted herself well, but it was an impossible situation.

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The NABJ always invites presidential candidates to attend its conference, and the three-time presidential candidate has always declined in the past. Why did he agree to attend this year? I can only guess, but it is worth noting that Trump is currently dodging accusations that he’s a scared little punk for refusing to debate Harris.

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By any objective political measure, the interview was a disaster for Trump. He came off as racist and mean-spirited. He promised to give cops immunity for beating up Black protesters. At one point, he even reached over, grabbed Scott’s water bottle, tightened the cap on it, and gave it back to her, which is just… weird.

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But exposing Trump as an awful human has functionally no journalistic value at this point. Is there a single person in the country who didn’t think Trump was racist before but does now? Is there a solitary voter who is saying to themselves, “I was going to vote for Trump but now seeing how he treated three Black women, I don’t know, I have my doubts”? It is a shockingly common belief among left-of-center folks to think that more exposure to Trump’s gross and unpopular antics will turn public sentiment against him, yet over the past eight years I’ve seen nearly no evidence of that actually happening, especially when those antics involve attacking Black people. Trump is an ignorant racist: Everybody either knows that, is that, or decided that is not a problem.

[...]

In this situation, Trump was given the opportunity to insult Black folks for 35 minutes, to our faces. What did we win for weathering that storm?

UPDATE 08/02/2024:

"[Trump's team] said, 'Well, can you not fact check? He's not going to take the stage if you fact-check,'" [NABJ president Ken] Lemon said.

The Q&A with the GOP presidential nominee was delayed more than an hour before he eventually joined a panel of Black journalists.

https://www.axios.com/2024/08/02/trump-nabj-fact-checking-black-journalists?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=editorial   Axios

And I imagine the fact that the panel was three black FEMALES set him off before he ever started.

Lemon told Axios, "There were audio problems, but they were resolved very quickly."

"The bigger problem was his threat not to take the stage when he had agreed to go on. He did not want to be fact-checked.

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The stalemate was so prolonged that NABJ leaders were prepared to explain to the audience of nearly 2,000 people why Trump would not appear.

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As Lemon was preparing that statement, Trump walked onto the stage.

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The Trump campaign disputes NABJ's account. Trump spokesperson Steven Cheung told Axios on Friday that they waited "for close to 40 minutes while audio/technical issues were fixed by NABJ."

Audio issues were apparent during the event.

There may have been more, but the "issues" I heard were Trump complaining he could only hear every other word the Fox reporter was saying, and her saying she had a hard time hearing him, too.