You had to see this one coming a mile away
Donald Trump has been stoking the flames of white nationalism since long before he descended down the escalator on June 16, 2015 to announce his campaign to run for president. He has a long history of making racist claims and attacking minorities with zero evidence to back it up. His worsening vitriolic remarks have resulted in bloodshed. It has all been in front of the public eye and plain to see, yet following numerous instances of people violently acting on Trump’s words, many have refused to call him out for it.
Frank Figliuzzi, a former FBI Assistant Director, penned an Op-ed in the New York Times last Wednesday foreshadowing the future death and racist destruction culminating from Trump’s hateful rhetoric, titled “Why Does Trump Fan the Flames of Race-Based Terrorism?” Sadly, Figliuzzi proved to be accurate, and the article was updated with the title, “I Predicted More Hate-Based Violence. El Paso Won’t Be the End of It.”
“I made that prediction because I learned from 25 years in the F.B.I., including during a stint as head of counterintelligence, to trust my gut when I saw a threat unfolding,” Figliuzzi stated. “Now, my instinct and experience tell me that El Paso will not be the end of it, and that we are headed for more hate-based violence potentially stoked by a divisive president.”
While such predictions could likely have been believed by most people observing Trump’s hateful and racist rhetoric and actions, it’s profound that a former FBI official was able to make such a prediction just days before such a deadly and terrible attack on American soil. Because Trump was incapable – either due to an Adderall-induced high (as suggested by his consistent sniffing) or a fear of losing his diminishing base – of adequately calling out white supremacists, “he has yet to apologize for painting people of color as outsiders and invaders, for calling for them to be sent back to where they came from, and for asserting that no humans would want to live in certain American cities,” according to Figliuzzi. Until that happens, and I won’t hold my breath, we can only expect such hateful and violent actions to continue.
I’m a ceramic engineer living in Central New York, avid sports fan but find myself more interested in politics lately.