During a Turning Point USA
“Teen Student Action Summit” in Washington on August 23, 2019,
Donald Trump rallied his young admirers with racist comments and
lies. Turning Point USA is shunned, or at least ignored by more
established conservative groups in Washington, but embraced by many
Trump supporters.
Since 2016, Turning Point
USA (TPUSA) has maintained a Professor Watchlist, which lists college
professors whom it alleges discriminate against conservative students
and advance left-wing propaganda in the classroom. The organization
has also secretly attempted to influence student government elections
in an effort to "combat liberalism on college and university
campuses.” TPUSA's founder, Charlie Kirk, is good friends with the
president's son, Donald Trump, Jr.
Turning Point leaders have
also praised ICE and GEO groups on social media. Former Turning Point
communications director Candace Owens claimed that she toured an ICE
transitional facility and raved about the conditions on Twitter
afterward. Owners said …
“This place is nicer
than where I went to the public school system.”
Owens is the same leader
who After the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville,
Virginia, said that concern over rising white nationalism was
"stupid.” On Facebook, Owens wrote "I proudly
self-identify as an Uncle Tom." The gunman who committed the
Christ Church mosque shootings (New Zealand, 2019) produced a
"manifesto" where he wrote that Owens had "influenced
(him) above all.”
Though TPUSA is a group
for collegiate Republicans, with more than 1,000 chapters across the
country and a pattern of racism and white supremacy in its top ranks,
organizers of the teen summit said the audience included droves of
high school students who were invited as part of a recruiting effort.
Even before Trump spoke,
other speakers parroted his racism. Eric Bolling – a former Fox
News host who was fired after a sexual harassment investigation –
said the president was right to tell them (the minority members of
the House of Representatives) to “go back,” especially Ilhan Omar
of Minnesota , whom he called “anti-Semitic.”
During his 80-minute
speech, Trump told the crowd that “the forces of political
correctness want to silence conservative students, make you feel
alone, marginalized and isolated.” He also asked the teenagers to
imagine the "100 percent" poll numbers he'd have without
the "dishonest" news media. And, in his vile, bigoted
manner, Trump slammed Representative Rashida Tlaib of Michigan.
Trump's words ...
“From Michigan,
right? It’s a great state. We won Michigan. There is no way she
stands for the values of the people of Michigan.
“But I watched her
this morning; she's vicious. She’s like a crazed lunatic. She’s
screaming. This is before she got into Congress. Who elected her?
She’s screaming like a total lunatic at one of our rallies. It’s
like I’m giving a little rally, and she starts screaming. And this
was — this is not a sane person, folks, when you look at that.
(Laughter.) “And
this is what we’re up against. You have some of that. Now, the
Democrats, I guess, are forced to embrace her. And I called it 'AOC
Plus 3.' Okay? AOC – 'AOC Plus 3.' (Applause.) Not that AOC is a
bargain, because she’s not. I mean, she’s no bargain. Look, I
mean, I — we’ll go into it at some point. I’ll tell you all
about AOC. I got more on AOC. (Applause.) AOC. AOC.”
Trump demonized Democrats
as captives who hate America …
“These people have
lost all control. And even the Democrats — they’re Left, but now
they’re getting dragged into a radical Left position. I can’t
imagine who’s doing that. But they’re being dragged — they’re
being dragged radical Left with these people that I believe —
honestly, I believe they hate our country. Okay? I believe they hate
our country. (Applause.)
“Anyone can become a
target of the Left’s brutal campaign to punish dissent. Hey, I’m
the number-one target in the world. And here we are. But I’m the
number-one target. Who’s more of a target than me? No matter what
you do, I’m the great target for these people. These people are
crazy.”
This is the judgmental
hatred encouraged by the leader of the free world. It reminds one of
the indoctrination of the Hitler youth in Nazi Germany. Here is yet
another overly pompous, narcissistic racist leading his opponents to
slaughter. I fear impressionable young people are being encouraged to
become bigoted, narrow-minded followers of a demagogue with no regard
for the truth.
Trump's views seldom have
substance or reason. Instead, he relies on emotional appeal to sway
his audience and to encourage them to believe in his twisted judgment
and disregard for the opposition. Encouraging teens to follow
blindly, he holds himself up as their political savior.
Raffi Cavoukian, known as
"the most popular children's singer in the English-speaking
world," has called Trump unfit for office, racist, and
misogynistic. Raffi said we must “fight fascism with everything
we’ve got.” Collier Meyerson of the Intelligencer (2019)
explained …
“Seemingly trite, the
addition of Raffi’s voice to the American political landscape is
actually invaluable. The singer-songwriter is the premier emissary
for children and his positions carry with them an incredible weight.”
"Your time is now,"
the president told his crowd at the TPUSA Teen Student Action Summit.
Trump's speech at the
summit encouraged young people to denigrate others and to exclude
elected representatives of our nation. His remarks make “your time
is now” a chilling statement condoning bigotry. It flies in the
face of “liberty and justice for ALL.” And, most disturbingly, it
knowingly legitimizes the continued use of racism.
During a 4-day conference
purportedly for educating conservative high school students, Trump
unleashed his hatred for minorities, for women, and for the opposing
political party. Turning Point USA describes itself as a youth
organization dedicated to educating and training and students "to
promote the principles of freedom, free markets, and limited
government." It is evident that the organization needs to find a
key note speaker who lives up to its ideals.
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