In today’s episode of Trump Might Be Orange, But He’s Still Exhaustingly White, President Donald Trump, on Wednesday, had lunch in the State Dining Room at the White House with the leaders of five African nations. Now, if you’ve witnessed literally any of Trump’s White House meetings with foreign leaders, you know it was only a matter of time before something embarrassing happened. We all saw how desperate he was to convince South Africa’s president that white Afrikaners were “fleeing” a (fictional) “white genocide” that President Cyril Ramaphosa didn’t realize was going on in his own country. (Because it wasn’t.)
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Well, this time, Trump reminded us that a lot of white people still don’t get that “You speak so well” isn’t the compliment to Black people that they think it is by asking the president of Liberia, where English is the official language, “Where did you learn to speak so beautifully?”
“Such good English,” Trump said to Liberian President Joseph Boakai. “Where did you learn to speak so beautifully? Where? Were you educated? Where?”
Mr. Boakai started to murmur appreciatively, and Mr. Trump continued: “In Liberia? Well, that’s very interesting. That’s beautiful English. I have people at this table can’t speak nearly as well.” There was some chuckling in the room.
Liberia has deep ties to the United States. Its founding was rooted in America’s “Back to Africa” movement and the American Colonization Society, a group formed in 1816 by philanthropists, abolitionists and some slave owners. That society, established in part as a response to rebellions of enslaved people, helped resettle free Black Americans in what would become Liberia.
Liberian leaders drew up a constitution in 1847 based largely on the American Declaration of Independence.
Now, look, I would bet my next paycheck that most Americans had no idea English was Liberia’s first language, or that of any African nation, for that matter. But most Americans are not the president of the United States. Most Americans aren’t a world leader who has a scheduled White House meeting with other world leaders, which a competent commander in chief would have prepared for by doing at least bare-minimum research on the small handful of foreign nations whose leaders he was hosting.
Does Trump not have free access to Google?
But, again, white people, especially white conservatives, just never really understood why complimenting Black people on how articulate we are — while having no discernible reason to assume we wouldn’t be articulate — is ignorant and inherently racist.
“Only the fake news could so pathetically pick apart President Trump’s heartfelt compliment during a meeting that marked a historic moment for U.S.-Africa relations,” said White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly.
“Asking the President of Liberia where he learned English when it’s literally the official language is peak ignorance,” said in a post on social media. “I’m pretty sure being blatantly offensive is not how you go about conducting diplomacy.”
