Black Twitter Reacts To Joe Biden Calling Trump 'First' Racist President

Biden’s statements are concerning, considering there have been various presidents throughout history who were either openly racist or carried out clearly racists policies or initiatives.  According to History.com, 12 presidents enslaved people during their lifetime and eight of these executive officers owned slaves while they were in office. Presidents that once owned slaves include George Washington, James Madison, James Monroe and Andrew Jackson. Even the place where the president resides, The White House, was built by slaves. It should be noted that their has yet to be a reparations package for Black former slaves or Black descendants of American slaves.

Even in modern times, extremely racist policies have occurred under key presidents. Japanese internment camps were established by President Franklin Roosevelt during World War II via his Executive Order 9066, according to History.com. Fast forward to Ronald Reagan‘s presidency in the 1980s, and he signed the Civil Liberties Act to compensate more than 100,000 people of Japanese descent who were held in internment camps. However, even Reagan’s political career was filled with racism. When running for governor of California in 1966, Reagan denounced the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and he even ran radio ads referring to urban areas as “jungles,” according to The Washington Post. When talking about fair housing, Reagan insisted, “If an individual wants to discriminate against Negroes or others in selling or renting his house, it is his right to do so.” Reagan also pushed the term “welfare queen,” which characterized Black people as abusers of government programs. On top of all this, just last year, an unearthed call between President Richard M. Nixon and Reagan in October 1971 had Reagan referring to African leaders as “monkeys” who are “still uncomfortable wearing shoes.” Either Biden missed all this history, or he’s consciously ignoring it. Biden’s campaign senior adviser Symone Sanders tried to clean up Biden’s words by acknowledging that although Trump isn’t the first racist president, he’s unique to modern history.