The former president’s cronies are planning to gut anti-discrimination policies should he retake the White House in November.
By Nikki McCann Ramirez, Rolling Stone —
Allies of Donald Trump and powerful conservative organizations are preparing to launch an offensive against “anti-white racism” should the former president retake the White House in November. According to a report from Axios, those in Trump’s orbit are gearing up for a widespread re-interpretation of civil rights laws to combat what they perceive as reverse racism against white Americans.
According to the report, this would include a mass gutting of government programs and diversity initiatives. “As President Trump has said, all staff, offices, and initiatives connected to Biden’s un-American policy will be immediately terminated,” Steven Cheung, a Trump campaign spokesperson, told Axios.
The initiative is already being spearheaded by former Trump adviser Stephen Miller, who founded the right-wing judicial activist outfit America First Legal after leaving the White House. Miller has leveraged Civil Rights-era laws intended to protect minorities from discrimination to challenge “woke” corporate policies of inclusion. America First Legal has sued Nike, Disney, United Airlines, the National Football League, and CBS Entertainment — among others— for allegedly discriminating against white men. Several of the lawsuits cite the 1964 Civil Rights Act, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex or national origin.
Miller and his organization are not acting alone. America First Legal was consulted by the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, in the drafting of its “Project 2025” policy handbook. The handbook contains language calling for an end to “affirmative discrimination,” and calls for an incoming conservative administration to “reorganize and refocus the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division to serve as the vanguard for this return to lawfulness.”
Trump himself has repeatedly claimed to be the target of anti-white discrimination. As previously reported by Rolling Stone, the former president has directed his advisers to look into ways he might compel the Justice Department to investigate New York Attorney General Letitia James, who successfully sued the former president for fraud last year. Trump regularly refers to James as “racist” in his social media posts and public statements.
Last week, National Review contributing editor Deroy Murdock suggested on Fox Business that Trump has grounds to sue James on the basis of discrimination.
“I think what President Trump should do is sue her on the basis of the 1964 Civil Rights Act,” Murdock said. When asked if he had suggested this directly to the former president, Murdock responded that he “will,” and that the message will get to Trump “sooner or later.”
Source: Rolling Stone
Featured image: Donald Trump at the Massapequa Funeral Home on March 28, 2024 in Massapequa, New York. (Spencer Platt, Getty)