President Donald Trump has condemned as "a symbol of hate" the Black Lives Matter street mural scheduled to be painted in huge letters on the surface of Fifth Avenue in front of his 58-story tall Trump Tower in New York City.
He also said the huge street mural will denigrate "this luxury avenue." Trump has never uttered the words "Black Lives Matter" in public.
On June 25, New York City mayor Bill de Blasio, a Democrat, ordered the very same words to be painted in bright yellow paint on Fifth Avenue. In a statement about this decision, de Blasio said Trump "is a disgrace to the values we cherish in New York City."
He also said Trump can't run away from or deny the reality of the Black Lives Matter campaign for racial justice and racial equality. De Blasio wants Trump to remember what Black Lives Matter stands for "any time he wants to set foot in the place he claims is his hometown."
De Blasio said painting the Black Lives Matter mural on Fifth Avenue will be completed by next week, after being postponed due to logistics issues. A similar Black Lives Mural was painted on Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the White House a few weeks ago on orders of Washington D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser, also a Democrat.
"Obviously we want the president to hear it because he's never shown respect for those three words" noted de Blasio. "When he hears Black Lives Matter, he presents a horrible negative reality of something that doesn't exist, and he misses the underlying meaning that we're saying us have to honor the role of African-Americans in our history and our society."
Trump took to Twitter Wednesday to assail de Blasio and the Black Lives Matters street mural.
This tweet was quickly condemned by New York City police reform groups. Trump is the only symbol of hate," asserted said Carolyn Martinez-Class, a spokesperson for the New York City organization Communities United for Police Reform. She said this tweet is Trump's latest attempt to brazenly push hate and try to divert people's attention from the urgent civil rights such as violent policing issues facing communities.
Trump remains hugely unpopular among Black Americans. An opinion poll from The Washington Post-Ipsos released June 25 shows 92% of Black American voters will vote for Joe Biden, the Democratic Party's presidential candidate, on November 3. Only 5% of Black voters will go for Trump.
The same poll shows 87% of Black voters saying Trump is biased against Black Americans. It also shows 75% strongly disapprove of the job Trump is doing as president. On the other hand, 9% approve of the way Trump handles his job.
