Though he’s prohibiting government agencies from marking Black History Month, President Trump on Thursday held an event at the White House celebrating the traditional monthlong commemoration though he ended up largely celebrating his election win and plans for a National Garden of Heroes.
At one point, the president informed the crowd that he won a higher percentage of Black voter support in 2024 than any other Republican presidential candidate (in 48 years … he left out that last part).
“One of the big reasons I’m president today is because of the Black vote, and I always appreciate it,” Trump said. “This is a very special time. It’s Black History Month. We love you all, we’re going to work with you. We’re gonna make America greater than ever before and we’re gonna do it together.”
Flanked by golfer Tiger Woods and Republican South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, the president then asked if he should seek a third term, though legally he is confined to two.
Showing the partisan make-up of the crowd, composed of celebrities and other supporters, attendees responded by chanting “Four more years! Four more years!”
As the event was underway, CNN reported that Charles Q. Brown, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs and a Black man, is on a list of generals the Trump administration could soon fire. His crime? Advocating for diversity in the ranks of enlisted men and women.
Trump has veered significantly from widely accepted views on racial disparities, throttling diversity, equity and inclusion programs at all government agencies.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, emphasizing machismo over diversity, declared “Identity Months Dead.”
“I think the single dumbest phrase in military history is ‘our diversity is our strength,’” Hegseth said told Pentagon employees at recent town hall.
Because of that new directive, the Maryland National Guard withdrew from an event celebrating the nation’s first civil rights leader, abolitionist Frederick Douglass.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy kicked off Black History Month by tweeting a ban on “celebrations based on immutable traits or any other identity-based observances,” which he said “do nothing to keep planes in the air, trains on the tracks or ports and highways secure.”
The Trump Administration is also moving to revamp the way Black history is taught in schools while treating the Civil Rights Act of 1964 as a law intended to protect alleged white victims of racism.
On Feb. 14, the Department of Education on February 14 sent a letter to American schools accusing them of violating the act and discriminating against White and Asian students with “pervasive and repugnant race-based preferences and other forms of racial discrimination that have emanated throughout every facet of academia.”
The letter suggests that diversity programs place “unique moral burdens” on and “stigmatize students who belong to particular racial groups based on crude racial stereotypes.” That’s seen a prelude to a historical whitewashing that would downplay slavery and Jim Crow laws because they do not align with Trump’s vision of a “patriotic education.”
Despite all of this, Trump received a warm reception at the Black History Month event. “Under our administration, we honor the indispensable role Black Americans have always played in the immortal cause of another date: 1776,” he said.
The president went in to share the story of Prince Estabrook, an enslaved man who became the first Black soldier to fight in the American Revolutionary War.
Trump said Estabrook would among those honored with a statue in his Garden of Heroes “along with revolutionaries like Booker T. Washington, Harriet Tubman, Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King Jr.” Black Americans from all walks of life, including athletes like Muhammad Ali and Kobe Bryant, will be included in the garden.
“We’ve made tribute to these heroes and so many others, but not simply because they’re Black heroes, but also because they are truly American heroes who inspire all of us very much,” Trump said.
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