Trump tells governors to ‘call in National Guard’ while saying “this is a great day” for George Floyd.
Donald Trump must suffers from foot-in-mouth syndrome but its America he embarrasses
At a Rose Garden event at the White House on Friday morning, Trump offered praise for members of the District of Columbia’s police department, the Secret Service and the National Guard for swiftly clamping down on demonstrators in the city.
Protests reached an inflection point on Monday night, when officers from a number of law enforcement agencies wielded batons and chemical agents to forcibly clear an area north of the White House complex.
“They came in and this was like a piece of cake,” Trump said of the D.C. National Guard, calling on governors across the country — but in particular New York Governor Andrew Cuomo — to take similar action to “dominate” local streets.
‘Don’t be proud’: Trump urges states to call up National Guard for weekend protests
Trump stated “Don’t be proud; get the job done. You’ll end up looking much better in the end,” Trump said. “You have to dominate the streets. You can’t let what’s happening happen.”
Trump moved from telling governors to dominate the streets then caused more outrage by saying “this is a great day” for George Floyd. More demonstrations are expected around the world over the weekend.
During a long, rambling press conference on Friday, Trump said that he hopes George Floyd is “looking down right now” on us, as he spoke about the slight dip in unemployment numbers.
Trump said in full: “Equal justice under the law must mean that every American receives equal treatment in every encounter with law enforcement, regardless of race, color, gender, or creed. They have to receive fair treatment from law enforcement. They have to receive it. We all saw what happened last week. We can’t let that happen.”
He continued, “Hopefully George is looking down right now and saying, ‘This is a great thing that’s happening for our country.’ It’s a great day for him, it’s a great day for everybody. It’s a great day for everybody. This is a great, great day in terms of equality.”
He continued, looking up from his notes: “We all saw what happened last week. We can’t let that happen. Hopefully, George is looking down right now, and saying ‘This is a great thing that’s happening for our country.’ This is a great day for him, it’s a great day for everybody … This is a great, great day in terms of equality.”
The remark came one day after a memorial service to celebrate Floyd’s life and after a 10th consecutive night of protests against racial injustice across the U.S. The mention of Floyd came toward the middle of the nearly hour-long event, during which Trump took a victory lap to celebrate a May jobs report that showed a 1.4 percentage point drop in the unemployment rate, a much stronger showing for the U.S. economy than had been widely expected.
The president declined to lay out any kind of plan for improving race relations in the U.S. and shut down questions from reporters who asked about the issue during what was billed as a news conference in White House’s Rose Garden.
Floyd was killed on Memorial Day after being pinned down by Minneapolis police officer who held his knee on Floyd’s neck for nearly nine minutes. The fatal encounter, captured on video, shows Floyd and citizen bystanders crying out for help. Floyd can be heard on the video crying out “I can’t breathe” before becoming unconscious.
The officer who pinned Floyd faces a second-degree murder charge while three other officers who aided in detaining the 46-year-old have been charged with aiding and abetting. The case has also sparked separate state and federal civil rights probes.
Floyd’s death has ignited protests around the globe and his final words have become a rallying cry for protesters who have taken to the streets to protest police killings of black Americans and call for an end to systemic racism.
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