Trump's racist tweets show that he does not understand America

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This is not an opinion. This is a statement of fact.

How can we take Trump's Sunday morning tweets – for the first-year democratic representatives, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (New York), Ilhan Omar (Minnesota), Rashida Tlaib (Mich.) And Ayanna Pressley (Mass.) – in which told the quartet, in essence, to come back from where they came from?

"So interesting to see women of the Progressive Democratic Congress", originating from countries where governments are a total and total disaster, the worst, most corrupt and most inapt in the world (if they even have a functioning government), now out loud and say fiercely to the people of the United States, the largest and most powerful nation in the world, how should our government be led.Why do not they go back to help fix the places totally devastated and infested with the crimes that fed them. "

Trump continued his attacks on Monday morning, calling the "Congress Women of the Radical Left", whom he has never yet named, to "apologize to our country, to the people of Israel. and even at the president's office "for what he called" their horrible & disgusting actions. "

Let's start with a few facts. Of the four people Trump told to return home in their own country, 3 out of 4 were born in the United States. The 4th – Omar – was born in Somalia, spent four years in a refugee camp in Kenya, arrived in the United States at the age of 12 and is a naturalized US citizen, according to the New York Times.

So telling them to go back to their "totally infested and infested crime from which they come" has very little factual meaning. But Trump is not terribly concerned about the facts here. It's the feeling that counts for him.

And this feeling is racist. Again, this is not an opinion. It's a fact.

Trump tells 4 non-white women that they are not here, that their views are not welcome and that they must withdraw from here. Rather than staying here, they must return to the countries of hell where they come from.

How does this behavior not fit the definition of racism in textbooks? (This definition, according to Merriam-Webster: "The belief that race is the determining factor of human characteristics and abilities and that racial differences produce the inherent superiority of a particular race.")

And it's not just racist. It's also anti-american. Because America, since at least the early days of the twentieth century, prides itself on thinking that this country – more than any other in the world – is a melting pot. It does not matter where you come from, how you arrived here or what your mother tongue is. We are all Americans – not reduced by the enormous diversity of those who came to this country, but improved and strengthened by it.

It's literally the full point of America. This is not a homogeneous block of look-alikes and look-alikes. It's a heterogeneous mix – a great, sometimes messy, experience in which our different lived experiences (and our past variants) can inform a better present and future.

Trump never really had this vision of or for America. During the campaign, he painted a dark picture of our diverse America – derogating from the so-called PC culture and suggesting that if he was not elected, it would mark the end of our American experience.

In his inaugural address, Trump painted a dystopian version of America to lead:

"Mothers and children trapped in poverty in our poor neighborhoods, destroyed factories scattered like tombstones across the landscape of our country, an education system bursting with money, but leaving our young and beautiful private students to know, the gangs and drugs that have stolen too many lives and deprived our country of so much unrealized potential … (…) This American carnage stops here and stops now. "

And all this was – and is – summarized in his now famous 4-word slogan: "Make America Great Again".

The insidious idea that lies beneath the surface of this slogan is: America was better before all this diversity. When everyone knew his place. When people did not ask what looked like people who looked like Donald Trump.

This mistake is inherent to this idea: America, at one time in the past, was better for all than now. Women, Hispanics, African Americans and gays – to name a few – know that this is not true. What the Trump slogan means – and what it has always meant – is that there was a time when whites – and men in particular – were running this country, and those times were better than what we have now.

Again, this is a racist and deeply anti-American sentiment. And a sentiment that has not only been expressed but has been repeatedly armed by the President of the United States for political purposes. And greeted with silence by the members of his party in Congress.

All this is abnormal in extremis. It is contrary to the commitment made by generations of past elected officials – from the president to the president of the PTA – to do something in public life that makes the country better for life all Americans.

Think about this rumination about the race – and what makes America really great – of Barack Obama, then country candidate, in March 2008:

"It was one of the tasks we had set out at the beginning of this campaign: to continue the long march of those who preceded us, a march for a more just, more equal, freer, more caring and more prosperous America. I chose to run for the presidency at this time in history because I am deeply convinced that we can only solve the problems of our time if we solve them together – unless we perfect our union by understanding that our stories can to be different, but we share hopes that we can not be like each other and that we did not come from the same place, but we all want to move in the same direction: towards a better future for children and our grandchildren. "

And now consider how much Sunday's Donald Trump tweets missed this target. It's surprising, scary and sad.

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