Move over Arianna Huffington!
Donald Trump is now co-opting “Black Voices”—as you did in 2011 when you took it over with your multimillion-dollar deal with AOL.
And as AOL did years before when they took it over from Barry Cooper and Tribune.
But I digress.
On Friday, AmeriKKKa’s favorite president hit Hotlanta—the quasi-mecca for upwardly mobile, Southern-centric black millennials and those who love them—to kick off his latest campaign effort called “Black Voices for Trump,” dedicated to recruiting and activating African-American voters who support him.
According to CNN, exit polls showed Trump won just 8 percent of African American voters in 2016.
He and his merry band of deplorables descended onto the Georgia World Congress Center, where hundreds gathered to either support his polarizing messaging or protest it (outside), according to the Washington Post.
Trump addressed the invitation-only crowd of a mostly black audience, which included much of the Georgia Republican top leadership.
Former presidential hopeful Herman Cain, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s niece Alveda King and former state legislator Melvin Everson were some of the conservative black notables in the place.
The event kicked off with an excerpt from “Lift Every Voice and Sing”—also known as the black national anthem.
“Under Democratic politicians, African Americans have become forgotten— literally forgotten—Americans,” Trump said, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “Under my administration, they’ve become forgotten no longer.”
“Trump’s No. 2” extolled the virtues of historical Republicans, from Abraham Lincoln to Dwight Eisenhower, who had a history of looking out for African Americans.
“To keep America great, we need all of you to lend your voice,” Vice President Mike Pence said. “African Americans and every American need four more years of President Donald Trump in the White House.”
“We need you to reach out to your friends, your neighbors, your churches,” Trump said. “We’re going to campaign for every last African American vote in 2020…We’re going to make 2020 a year of change in black communities all across the country.”
Atlanta contractor and Air Force veteran Kelvin King got on stage and praised Trump’s economic agenda and thanked the president for “making the black community a priority.”
“Our future success depends on our success in ignoring the distractions we see on a daily basis,” he said. “Don’t sit on the sidelines because of emotions or feelings.”
And of course, Uncle Ben was in the house.
The once-revered brain surgeon-turned-Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson took to the podium to do some of Trump’s bidding, reportedly drawing a standing ovation after stating that if “Trump is a racist, he’s an awfully bad one.”
Carson remains the one and only African American member of Trump’s cabinet.
The Wall Street Journal reported that 375 black supporters “cheered and chanted ‘four more years’” and many wore “Blacks for Trump” T-shirts and some wore hats with the logo “Black Lives MAGA.”
Black Lives MAGA.
Yeezus Kriste Almighty.