Family Research Council tries to clean up Trump's racist attack on Baltimore by distorting the controversy

Tony Perkins (bottom) and his group, the Family Research Council, are trying to clean up Donald Trump's (top) racist comments about Baltimore by distorting the entire controversy.

Donald Trump recently said some awful things about the city of Baltimore as part of an attack on Congressman Elijah Cummings. Cummings, a long-time critic of Trump, is the chair of the House Oversight and Reform Committee which has apparently opened 23 investigations into the Trump Administration. Last week, the committee authorized subpoenas for records of senior White House officials' use of personal email and text services for business purposes.

This is what led Trump to say the following via tweets last week:

"Rep, Elijah Cummings has been a brutal bully, shouting and screaming at the great men & women of Border Patrol about conditions at the Southern Border, when actually his Baltimore district is FAR WORSE and more dangerous. His district is considered the Worst in the USA," Mr. Trump said in the first of several tweets. 

 "As proven last week during a Congressional tour, the Border is clean, efficient & well run, just very crowded. Cumming District is a disgusting, rat and rodent infested mess. If he spent more time in Baltimore, maybe he could help clean up this very dangerous & filthy place," Mr. Trump continued. He threatened to investigate the federal funds sent to Cummings' district, and said that "no human being would want to live there."

The firestorm was enormous as Trump faced a huge blow back of criticism, with many pointing out how the tone of these attacks fit a racist narrative he applies to the black community.

According to Vox:

Trump’s Baltimore remarks also fit into a longer history of racism from the president, whose attacks on African Americans and other people of color date back to when he first faced allegations of housing discrimination in the 1970s. During his 2016 presidential campaign, Trump repeatedly asked black people “What the hell do you have to lose” by voting for him, regularly painting black communities as universally besieged by crime, poverty, and violence, as he made his pitch. 

Those attempts were criticized for trafficking in racist tropes about black communities, a criticism that has reemerged with his latest attacks. In specifically invoking the image of predominantly black areas as “disgusting, rodent and rat infested” places where “no human being would want to live” Trump is using stereotypes of black communities that have existed for generations. And these stereotypes have long been used to amplify white Americans’ worst beliefs about black people and the communities and neighborhoods they live in. 

The recent tweets from the president fit into a broader way that Trump often talks about predominantly black cities and neighborhoods, framing these areas as consistently impoverished areas struggling with the highest rates of violence in the world (even when they aren’t even that violent compared to other cities). But it was his claim that Cummings’s Baltimore district is “rat-infested” that got a lot of early attention over the weekend. And it’s not hard to see why: that claim in particular fits into centuries-old stereotypes of black places — and people — as being dirty and unhygienic.

Those are the facts. But there are some attempting to defending Trump. Pat Robertson's network, CBN, with the help of Fox News, ran an ugly piece attacking Baltimore.  Fox News itself (Trump's propaganda station) has run several hit pieces via its personalities, such as this one.

But to top it all off, the Family Research Council has tried to recast the entire situation. The group is implying that Trump is being unfairly attacked for telling the truth:

Nobody goes to the playgrounds anymore. They're abandoned -- except for the gangs. "You saw them selling drugs, right there," reporter Lawrence Jones said, fuming. "Nobody came to break it up." To the longtime residents of Baltimore, the changes have been staggering. "I've lived here 58 years," one man explained, "and it was such an honor and pleasure to live here. And what I see now -- sometimes I just drive through, and I'm almost in tears." It may not be popular, but what the president said, one African-American woman told Lawrence, "it's true." 

Away from Twitter and the national limelight, their stories were all the same. One after another, people admitted they were scared to raise a family in Baltimore -- even though it was home. When President Trump was brutally honest about the nightmarish conditions of their city, most of the residents were just relieved someone finally cared enough to say something. "I understand in many circles, they think the conservative message wouldn't be welcome here..." Jones said. "[But Baltimore] has tried the liberal message for over 70 years in this town, and it's been reckless to the people here... They don't care about the politics." They want change. 

Democrats, on the other hand, aren't interested in change. They took the public spat between the White House and Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.) as another opportunity to stand in front of the cameras and call the president a racist. Apparently, that's the only card the Left wants to play. Any time the president challenges the status quo in these urban settings, he's prejudiced. 

 . . .Obviously, the Left's game plan is to shut down any form of discussion or debate -- which, if it's done civilly, could move us forward as a country. But when you throw out labels, like the far-Left has, you're doing great damage to the United States of America. Racial division, we should all know by now, does no one any good. In the end, all it does is keep people trapped in a toxic environment that's hurting generations of Americans.

Trump was not being brutally honest. He was not challenging the status quo. He was engaging in a vulgar racist attack against a Congressman who is investigating possible wrongdoings in his Administration. And he told a bunch of lies.

According to Raw Story:

The realities of Baltimore are vastly different than the stereotype. Baltimore may have a homeless problem, but it’s Trump’s home city that ranks first in the nation for homelessness and his adopted city of Washington, DC also appears among the top cities for homelessness. In fact, Baltimore doesn’t even appear in the top ten worst cities.

New York also ranks among the top three for rat problems, as does Trump’s current home, Washington, DC. Baltimore appears at ninth-worst. New Your City is so notorious for its rat problem, some of the critters have become internet stars for dragging a massive piece of pizza down the stairs of the subway. 

Baltimore does have a crime problem, but it’s not in the top four. That honor belongs to four cities in states that voted for Trump in the 2016 election. St. Louis, Missouri, Detroit, Michigan, Memphis, Tennessee and Milwaukee, Wisconsin appear higher than Baltimore, Maryland when it comes to crime problems per-capita.

And many Baltimore residents have voiced support and love of their city in the face of Trump's attack, in spite of what FRC claimed. 

What's happening is the Family Research Council - and the rest - are defending Trump not because they think he is right. They are defending him because they are scared that repercussions from his actions will cause voters to turn against him, thus losing him the 2020 election. And if Trump leaves office, their access to the White House and policy issues would be cut off. It's nothing more than cynical pandering from a bunch of power hungry sycophants using religion as a prop. Threaten their cash cow and watch how quickly they drop their masks of piety.