“Simply Lying”: Marc Lamont Hill Slams Trump’s NABJ Interview, Attacks on VP Harris’s Racial Identity

AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman.

Later in the broadcast, we’ll go to Katrina vanden Heuvel, publisher of The Nation magazine, about the historic prisoner swap. But first, fallout is continuing from Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump’s comments Wednesday when he was interviewed at the annual convention of the National Association of Black Journalists.

NABJ President Ken Lemon told Axios Trump nearly refused to do the interview when he learned he would be fact-checked. Lemon said he was about to, quote, “craft a statement, saying he decided not to go on stage because of fact-checking. … We couldn’t compromise on that,” unquote. As he prepared his statement, Lemon said Trump walked onto the stage.

In some of his most inflammatory remarks, Trump questioned Vice President Harris’s Black identity, even though Harris, whose father is a Jamaican economist, mother an Indian scientist, Indian American scientist, has consistently identified as Black and South Asian. Harris called Trump’s comments, quote, “the same old show,” after Trump previously questioned the American citizenship of President Barack Obama and Republican Nikki Haley.

At the NABJ convention, Trump was questioned by three Black women journalists: Fox News Channel’s Harris Faulkner, Semafor‘s Kadia Goba and ABC‘s Rachel Scott, who began the interview.

RACHEL SCOTT: I want to start by addressing the elephant in the room, sir. A lot of people did not think it was appropriate for you to be here today. You have pushed false claims about some of your rivals, from Nikki Haley to former President Barack Obama, saying they were not born in the United States, which is not true. You have told four congresswomen of color, who were American citizens, to go back to where they came from. You have used words like “animal” and “rabid” to describe Black district attorneys. You’ve attacked Black journalists, calling them a “loser,” saying the questions that they ask are, quote, “stupid and racist.” You’ve had dinner with a white supremacist at your Mar-a-Lago resort. So, my question, sir, now that you are asking Black supporters to vote for you, why should Black voters trust you after you have used language like that?

DONALD TRUMP: Well, first of all, I don’t think I’ve ever been asked a question so — in such a horrible manner, a first question. You don’t even say, “Hello. How are you?” Are you with ABC? Because I think they’re a fake news network, a terrible network. And I think it’s disgraceful that I came here, in good spirit.

I love the Black population of this country. I’ve done so much for the Black population of this country, including employment, including opportunity zones with Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina, which is one of the greatest programs ever for Black workers and Black entrepreneurs. I’ve done so much and — you know, and I say this. Historically Black colleges and universities were out of money. They were stone-cold broke. And I saved them, and I gave them long-term financing. And nobody else was doing it.

I think it’s a very rude introduction. I don’t know exactly why you would do something like that.

And let me go a step further. I was invited here, and I was told my opponent, whether it was Biden or Kamala — I was told my opponent was going to be here. It turned out my opponent isn’t here. You invited me under false pretense. And then you said, “You can’t do it with Zoom.” Well, you know, where’s Zoom? She’s going to do it with Zoom, and she’s not coming. And then you were half an hour late. Just so we understand, I have too much respect for you to be late. They couldn’t get their equipment working, or something was wrong.

RACHEL SCOTT: Mr. President, I would love if you can answer the question —

DONALD TRUMP: I think it’s a very nasty question.

RACHEL SCOTT: — on your rhetoric and why you believe that Black voters —

DONALD TRUMP: I have answered the question.

RACHEL SCOTT: — should trust you with another four years.

DONALD TRUMP: I have been the best president for the Black population since Abraham Lincoln.

RACHEL SCOTT: Better than —

DONALD TRUMP: That’s my answer.

RACHEL SCOTT: Better than President Johnson, who signed the Voting Rights Act?

DONALD TRUMP: That’s my answer. And for you to start off a question-and-answer period, especially when you’re 35 minutes late because you couldn’t get your equipment to work, in such a hostile manner, I think it’s a disgrace.

AMY GOODMAN: The NABJ traditionally invites both Republican and Democratic presidential candidates to the convention every election cycle. Democrat Kamala Harris is reportedly in talks to do a virtual question-and-answer session with NABJ next month.

For more, we’re joined in Philadelphia by the longtime journalist and member of the National Association of Black Journalists, Marc Lamont Hill. He’s host of UpFront on Al Jazeera English and a nightly YouTube show called Night School, also professor of anthropology and urban education at the City University of New York Graduate Center and the co-author of Except for Palestine: The Limits of Progressive Politics and author of We Still Here: Pandemic, Policing, Protest, and Possibility.

Marc, welcome to Demcoracy Now! Can you start off by responding to this opening of the joint questioning by three Black NABJ members — that’s Black journalists — of President Trump?

MARC LAMONT HILL: Good morning, Amy. It’s good to see you, always good to be here.

I was — I wish I could say I was shocked or disappointed. This is exactly what Donald Trump does. He came into the room. He was disrespectful. He was condescending. He steamrolled the interview. This was an opportunity for him to make a presentation to Black journalists and to Black voters. And instead, he was nasty. He was vile. He demonstrated all the misogynistic and racist and patriarchal sensibilities that we would expect from Donald Trump. And, of course, he spent a lot of that time simply lying.

To say that NABJ was 35 minutes late to start not only kind of — and that the equipment doesn’t work, plays on this idea that, you know, the Black journalists can’t get it together, that Black people show up late and that their stuff doesn’t work, when, in fact, as you pointed out, it started late because Donald Trump was resisting the idea of being fact-checked. He was resisting the idea that people could actually hold him accountable for the things that he says that are not true, because if you do that, then he has to explain how he’s spreading such inaccurate information about people on the other side of the border taking Black jobs, or misrepresenting his contributions to HBCUs and all the other things that he says makes him the greatest president for Black people since Abraham Lincoln.

AMY GOODMAN: I want to go more to what Trump said when being questioned about Kamala Harris. This is ABC News’ Rachel Scott.

RACHEL SCOTT: Some of your own supporters, including Republicans on Capitol Hill, have labeled Vice President Kamala Harris, who is the first Black and Asian American woman to serve as vice president and be on a major-party ticket, as a ”DEI hire.” Is that acceptable language to you? And will you tell those Republicans and those supporters to stop it?

DONALD TRUMP: How do you — how do you define DEI? Go ahead. How do you define it?

RACHEL SCOTT: Diversity, equity, inclusion.

DONALD TRUMP: OK, yeah, go ahead. Is that what your definition? Give me —

RACHEL SCOTT: That is —

DONALD TRUMP: Give me a definition, then.

RACHEL SCOTT: That is literally the words, DEI.

DONALD TRUMP: Would you give me a definition of that? Give me a definition of that.

RACHEL SCOTT: Sir, I’m asking you a question, a very direct question.

DONALD TRUMP: No, no. You have to define it. Define the — define it for me, if you would.

RACHEL SCOTT: I just defined it, sir. Do you believe that Vice President Kamala Harris is only on the ticket because she is a Black woman?

DONALD TRUMP: Well, I can say, no, I think it’s maybe a little bit different. So, I’ve known her a long time indirectly, not directly very much. And she was always of Indian heritage, and she was only promoting Indian heritage. I didn’t know she was Black until a number of years ago, when she happened to turn Black, and now she wants to be known as Black. So, I don’t know: Is she Indian, or is she Black?

RACHEL SCOTT: She has always identified as a Black woman.

DONALD TRUMP: But you know what?

RACHEL SCOTT: She went to a historically Black college.

DONALD TRUMP: I respect either one. I respect either one. But she obviously doesn’t, because she was Indian all the way, and then, all of a sudden, she made a turn, and she went — she became a Black person.

AMY GOODMAN: Marc Lamont Hill. By the way, we were really focusing on playing Rachel Scott and the other journalists’ questions, because I think they were very significant, especially as Rachel Scott continued to follow up and continued to be attacked by President Trump.

MARC LAMONT HILL: Absolutely. I mean, one of the fascinating things is, you have to watch it two or three times, that interview, to actually hear some of the pushback and to hear some of the follow-ups, because Donald Trump simply steamrolled. He yelled over them. He talked over them. He ignored them. He basically filibustered. They had, I think, 36 minutes, and he may have answered substantively three or four questions, because of how he responded.

But specifically with regard to the Kamala Harris thing, Donald Trump did several moves that are just, you know, textbook Trump. First thing he does is, when he’s presented with a question that he doesn’t understand, he presents it back to the questioner as if they don’t understand it. He did the same thing to Laura Ingraham the other day when she asked about his pronouns and gender fluidity. He says, “Well, what are pronouns? What do you think about pronouns?” Because he doesn’t actually understand. He doesn’t actually understand what DEI is, but he understands that it’s often used as a kind of racist trope against Black people to suggest that they’re unqualified for the things that they get.

What he could have said is, “Of course she’s qualified.” And he doesn’t have to — he doesn’t have to address the DEI part of it, just said, “She’s qualified. I disagree with her. She’s my opponent.” But that would be too decent. Instead, he attacks fundamentally her racial identity. He says that she used to be something else, and now she just became Black. That’s simply untrue.

Kamala Harris grew up with a very clear identity, both of her Indian mother, Indian American mother, but also of her Jamaican father. She is Black. She’s indisputably Black. We can have lineage questions about whether she’s African American or not, but she’s certainly Black. Black is a diasporic identity. She went to Howard University, an HBCU. She pledged a historically Black sorority, the first, Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Incorporated. She was a member of BALSA in law school. I met Kamala Harris 20 years ago at BET. You know, we were doing Hip Hop vs. America. I mean, at every moment, whether she’s doing Tavis Smiley’s State of the Black Union or whether she’s advocating for Black people, she’s very clearly and indisputably Black, and she’s always identified as such. I disagree with her profoundly on issues. I’m not saying that we share the same political ideology. But she’s certainly Black.

But this is an attempt by Donald Trump to create a wedge between Kamala Harris and Black voters. And there’s a slice of Black voters who are looking for a reason — and a slice of white voters who are looking for a reason — not to vote for Kamala Harris, and he’s just trying to give it to them.

AMY GOODMAN: I want to go to Semafor’s Kadia Goba questioning Donald Trump at the NABJ convention as part of this onstage interview.

KADIA GOBA: So, Sonya Massey, someone from Illinois, an unarmed Black woman, was shot the other day in her home by a deputy sheriff. The deputy has since been charged with murder. You’ve said police would get immunity from prosecution if you win. Why should someone like that officer have immunity, in your opinion?

DONALD TRUMP: Immunity?

KADIA GOBA: Immunity.

DONALD TRUMP: I don’t know the exact case, but I saw something, and it didn’t look — it didn’t look good to me. It didn’t look good to me. Are you talking — with the water, right?

KADIA GOBA: Yeah. Well, police —

DONALD TRUMP: It didn’t look —

KADIA GOBA: I mean, police unions are not backing this person, either.

DONALD TRUMP: OK, OK.

KADIA GOBA: But again, why would —

DONALD TRUMP: And they’re going to — are they going to be charging the officer? I guess they’re charging the officer.

KADIA GOBA: So, why should he receive immunity?

DONALD TRUMP: Well, he might not. I mean, it depends. It depends on what happens.

AMY GOODMAN: Marc Lamont Hill, your response? Of course, he’s talking about — or, Kadia is raising the issue of the police killing of Sonya Massey. The police officer has been charged with first-degree murder. Ben Crump and the family are calling for the resignation of the deputy, the sheriff — the chief of that area of Illinois. It’s just a few hours from Chicago, where the Democratic convention will be held.

MARC LAMONT HILL: Yeah. Donald Trump had an opportunity here to actually address a Black audience with a substantive answer. First, he showed up saying, “I don’t know the story.” I mean, can you imagine showing up to a convention of Black journalists and addressing the needs and interests of Black people and not being read in, not being informed on one the most important, perhaps, story going on and circulating in our community right now? It seemed like a no-brainer for his team, if they took Black people or Black communities seriously.

And when Donald Trump says, “Well, I saw, and it didn’t look good,” if you said that to me, Amy, I would presume you meant, “Oh yeah, it didn’t look good. Those officers clearly were out of line. They shot this woman, you know, who was defenseless.” But when Donald Trump says it, I don’t know what the heck he means. I suspect he meant — because he said “with the water,” I suspect that he was actually transmitting the misinformation, the outright lie, that she was attacking the officers with water, which would justify their use of force, but doesn’t because it didn’t happen. So, again, with Donald Trump, it’s very unclear.

But the fundamental question that she was asking, which I think was an important one, is: If you’re giving all officers immunity, then things like this will happen without any accountability; how do you reconcile wanting to give everybody immunity with incidents like this when police get it wrong? And he didn’t have an answer for that. I don’t think he has the intellectual capacity to understand the question, but also he doesn’t have the maturity to sit there and wrestle with it. Instead, he just filibusters, talks, you know, asks other — and misdirects. And it’s really disappointing, but, again, it’s more evidence that Donald Trump doesn’t actually have the intellectual capacity, the political sophistication or the moral competence to be president of anything.

AMY GOODMAN: I want to go back to ABC News’ Rachel Scott asking Trump a question.

RACHEL SCOTT: Mr. President, I would love to ask you about January 6th. You called yourself the candidate of law and order.

DONALD TRUMP: Yeah.

RACHEL SCOTT: When Time magazine asked you if you would consider pardoning all the rioters, you said, “Yes, absolutely.”

DONALD TRUMP: Sure.

RACHEL SCOTT: You called them patriots. One hundred and forty police officers were assaulted that day. Their injuries included broken bones. At least one officer lost an eye. One had two cracked ribs, two smashed spinal discs. Another had a stroke. Were the people who assaulted those 140 officers, including those I just mentioned, patriots who deserve pardons?

DONALD TRUMP: Well, let me bring it back to modern day, like about five days ago. We had an attack on the Capitol, a horrible attack on the Capitol. You saw the people that were protesting and spraying these incredible monuments, bells, lions, all these magnificent limestone and granite, with red paint, red spray paint, that will never actually come off, especially on the limestone. It will never — I’m a builder. I know about this stuff. It will never — you’ll see it in a hundred years from now. They viciously attacked our government. They fought with police. They fought with them much more openly than I saw on January 6th. What’s going to happen to those people? What’s going to happen to the people in Portland that destroyed that city?

RACHEL SCOTT: But, sir, my question is on those —

DONALD TRUMP: What’s going to happen to the people that tried to burn —

RACHEL SCOTT: My question is on those rioters who assaulted officers.

DONALD TRUMP: Excuse me. You have to ask —

RACHEL SCOTT: Would you pardon those people?

DONALD TRUMP: — what’s going to happen — oh, absolutely, I would, if they’re innocent.

RACHEL SCOTT: You pardon those —

DONALD TRUMP: If they’re innocent, I would pardon them.

RACHEL SCOTT: They’ve been convicted.

AMY GOODMAN: Marc Lamont Hill?

MARC LAMONT HILL: He’s a fascinating person. First of all, “If they’re innocent, I’ll pardon them” is the most ridiculous statement. If they’re innocent, they don’t need a pardon, right?

But what she was asking very clearly is: How do you reconcile calling these people patriots, these people who are protesting, but they’re just not — they’re not just protesting. They’re destroying the Capitol. They’re raising an insurrection. They’re trying to overtake a democratic institution ostensibly. How do you justify calling them patriots and wanting to give them pardons? He couldn’t answer it.

So, again, as Donald Trump does, and like most people with sort of toddler levels of political maturity do, he redirected, and he said, “Let’s go to recent history of five days ago,” and he starts talking about people who are protesting a genocide. He talks about people who are challenging American imperialism. And he tries to equate the two. And even then, he doesn’t offer any kind of reasonable analysis.

So, that’s two things that we have to think about. One, Donald Trump refuses to hold accountable the white supremacists and the insurrectionists and all the other people who are waging war against the vulnerable in this country, and who have done so in demonstrable fashion. Even people like Donald Trump who call themselves law and order president, people who defend the blue no matter what, he even has created space to basically indemnify the people who harm the police who he worships.

But then, when someone is standing up against a genocidal war, when someone is not waging war on the Capitol, he called it an attack on the Capitol. Protesting in D.C. is not an attack on the Capitol. Donald Trump would probably call the March on Washington a vicious assault on our nation’s home, right? Because he sees anybody who’s Black or Brown or standing in solidarity with oppressed people as an enemy to the state. And in an imperialist state, he’s not all the way wrong. But that’s exactly why we can’t have someone like Donald Trump as the steward of this empire.