Donald Trump’s attack on the Mayor of San Juan, Puerto Rico is his lowest point yet
After botching his response to the post-hurricane Puerto Rico crisis on a historically inept level, Donald Trump callously headed out to his golf resort for the weekend. If you were hoping that he’d at least have the sense to stay quiet and leave bad enough alone, you were hoping for too much. Instead, Trump went off the deep end this morning on a level that was jarring even by his standards, viciously attacking the Mayor of San Juan, Puerto Rico.
Trump’s tweets about Mayor Carmen Yulín Cruz were so cartoonishly over the top, they read like something from a parody account: “The Mayor of San Juan, who was very complimentary only a few days ago, has now been told by the Democrats that you must be nasty to Trump. Such poor leadership ability by the Mayor of San Juan, and others in Puerto Rico, who are not able to get their workers to help. They want everything to be done for them when it should be a community effort. 10,000 Federal workers now on Island doing a fantastic job. The military and first responders, despite no electric, roads, phones etc., have done an amazing job. Puerto Rico was totally destroyed.”
Because that wasn’t embarrassing enough, Trump continued: “Fake News CNN and NBC are going out of their way to disparage our great First Responders as a way to “get Trump.” Not fair to FR or effort! The Fake News Networks are working overtime in Puerto Rico doing their best to take the spirit away from our soldiers and first R’s. Shame!” It’s difficult to even put in context what this means for American democracy. The person (illegitimately) occupying the office of President of the United States is publicly attacking the Mayor of a United States city, while that city’s people are dying due to the President’s ineptness.
Moreover, Donald Trump’s tweets about Puerto Rico are rather blatantly racist. When he says “They want everything to be done for them” it’s clear he’s accusing Puerto Ricans of being lazy minorities. That’s to say nothing of his unpatriotic attempt at hiding behind the military and first responders. Again, Puerto Rico is part of the United States. Donald Trump clearly does not understand anything about America.
