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TRUMP’S NEW JIM CROW  
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Bill Mosley
January 31, 2025
Outside the Box [[link removed]]

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_ DEI is not a conspiracy to make white people feel bad about
themselves; it’s a society-wide effort to combat past discrimination
against everyone who is not a white, straight, able-bodied male. For
Trump, that is the problem. _

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Let’s not mince words:  Trump is trying to re-segregate the federal
government, and as much of the rest of society as he can.  And he’s
targeting more than black people.

That’s what his attack on DEI (diversity, equity, inclusion) is all
about.  It’s the new racist dog whistle, his version of George H.W.
Bush’s “Wille Horton” ads.  But Trump has replaced the whistle
with a bullhorn.  He’s out to do more than win votes – after all,
he already won the election.  He’s on a warpath to set back the
achievements of women, people of color, the LGBTQ community and people
with disabilities.  He wants to turn the clock back to the early
1960s, during the Jim Crow era, before major civil rights legislation
and the rise of the feminist, LGBTQ rights and disability rights
movements. 

If anyone had doubts, they could watch his January 30 press conference
in which he pre-emptively blamed DEI for the airliner-helicopter crash
near National Airport.  With an investigation just starting, he cited
inclusive hiring at the FAA and other unspecified policies from past
Democratic administrations, in addition to claiming that Obama during
his administration called the FAA “too white.”  He also made a
point of complaining about the FAA’s past efforts to hire more
employees with disabilities.  It was pointed out in some media that
the FAA’s hiring outreach stemmed at least as much from its chronic
staffing shortages as from concern for civil rights (and early reports
on the DC crash investigation indicate understaffing might have played
a role).  He implied that Pete Buttigieg, Biden’s transportation
secretary, was somehow complicit in the crash, knowing that Buttigieg
is openly gay.

This follows Trump’s firing of Coast Guard Commandant Linda Fagan,
the first woman to lead any branch of the armed forces.  He claimed
it was because of various leadership deficiencies, but it was clearly
because she was a woman.  In his view, women are not only incapable
of leading a branch of the armed forces; they barely belong in the
military at all.  This act of blatant sex discrimination hasn’t
been condemned widely enough.  His disdain of women in the military
was a factor in his nomination of MAGA Bro Pete Hegseth as defense
secretary – what the military needs for a leader is a manly man,
notwithstanding his total lack of qualifications, his boozing, his sex
abuse, etc.  For Trump, Hegseth’s past statements against women
serving in combat were part of his attraction, and his history of
sexual abuse a proof that he has the masculine bona fides for the job.
 

DEI is not a conspiracy to make white people feel bad about
themselves; it’s a society-wide effort to combat past discrimination
against everyone who is not a white, straight, able-bodied male.  For
Trump, that is the problem.  He now is trying to coerce federal
employees – perhaps those few who remain after the current purge –
to squeal on fellow workers not sufficiently hostile to diversity. 
This could make hiring officials fear that they themselves could
become targets if they brought aboard anyone in a high-level position
who was not white. Trump wants to take his war against DEI beyond the
government to schools, colleges, federal contractors, organizations
receiving federal grants, and any other place he can exert leverage or
intimidation.

A few articles have appeared in the media about which previous
presidents Trump is trying to emulate, assuming he’s read enough
history to know much about any of them.  There was McKinley for his
embrace of tariffs, or Jackson for his penchant for not recognizing
limits on his presidential power.  But I would add Woodrow Wilson as
an inspiration, for he was a virulent racist who undid modest earlier
efforts to integrate the federal workforce. He brought heavy-handed
Jim Crow policies against blacks in government, demoting them from
senior positions and imposing strict separation by race.  In recent
years more historians and journalists have recognized this side of
Wilson and diminished his historical stature.  Playing the Hitler
card is frowned upon, but there also are parallels between Trump and
the Nazis’ campaign to degrade Jews. 

A few politicians from the center to the left are waking up to the
fact that Trump cannot be accommodated.  There is no working with
him, no finding common ground, for Trump is not willing to work within
democratic norms. Democratic elected officials and the greater public
need to stop him in his tracks.  Trump’s moves are revving up his
MAGA base, but they are also making enemies of people not usually
engaged in politics.  Can this grow into an effective opposition?  I
leave the question unanswered. 

_Bill Mosley is a Washington, DC writer and activist._

_“Outside the Box” goes beyond the conventional wisdom to explore
new ideas and attitudes, to rise beyond the gravity of the everyday. 
To challenge assumptions and look beyond the obvious._

* segregation
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* DEI
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* federal workers
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* Woodrow Wilson
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* Donald Trump
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