President Donald Trump is being widely condemned for his refusal Tuesday night to condemn white supremacists. Instead of condemning the extremists, the president took control of a group of neo-fascist nationalistic violence-promoters known as the “Proud Boys.”
One of Trump’s top critics is a counterterrorism expert who saw Trump’s actions up close and first hand. She says Trump is already “complicit in the deaths of Americans.”
Elizabeth Neumann served as President Trump’s Assistant Secretary for Threat Prevention and Security Policy at the Dept. of Homeland Security until several months ago.
Today she is blasting Trump for his “dangerous” refusal to condemn white supremacists, and says “white supremacist groups & the Proud Boys have been energized by his comments.”
Neumann is cautioning that the “root ideologies at play are responsible for the [Oklahoma] City Bombing,” a 1995 domestic terrorism attack that killed at least 168 people, including children, and injured nearly 700 others.
President Trump’s comments “fall into both the ‘first-hand’ and ‘dangerous’ category,” Neumann says. “I served at DHS as the Asst Secretary for Counterterrorism from 2018-2020. The surge of violent white nationalism happened on my watch.”
Neumann looks at her first-hand experience with Trump to offer some disturbing history.
“I worked to develop policies, laws, and programs to better prevent domestic terrorism. My colleagues & I tried to educate the President and his staff on this threat. Initially, I thought the rebuffing was due to having other priorities (e.g., defeat ISIS, counter Iran, etc).”
And then, a devastating realization.
“He instead told these groups to ‘Stand Back and Stand By’. Online activity shows white supremacist groups & the Proud Boys have been energized by his comments as a rallying cry to attack ‘ANTIFA’ and ‘left-wing’ groups. They’ve already created a logo with those words.”
She’s absolutely correct.
Neumann is the co-founder of Republican Political Alliance for Integrity and Reform (RePAIR), and has endorsed Joe Biden for president.
Related –
Watch: Trump Just Can’t Bring Himself to Condemn White Supremacists
Image by U.S. Customs and Border Protection/Donna Burton via Flickr