Notes

After the Women’s March: Truth, Trump and The American Way
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At the 2007 march across the Edmund Pettis Bridge commemoration in Selma, a young congressman made the case for supporting Barack Obama’s presidential campaign. Many of those in the audience and watching on television still viewed the first term U.S. Senator’s pursuit of the presidency warily. The African American politician took them head on.
Each of us, he said that day, had looked into the eyes of some young person and told them they could be anything they want to be if they work hard enough. At that moment, deep down inside, we knew we were lying to them just a little bit because there were some jobs in America that still had “Whites Only” signs on them.
If Barack Obama is successful, he continued, we could tell young people they can be whatever they want to be and tell them the truth at the same time. It was a powerful and persuasive argument that struck to the core of the Black struggle for freedom and equality in America.
America is certainly not post-racial. Black people go to worse schools, get sent to more jails, live poorer, and die earlier. Stony the road we trod, the song says, but after the election of Barack Obama there was no job in America that had a “Whites Only” sign left on it.
The trend lines had been clear for decades in every field. There were famous names such as Tiger Woods, Oprah Winfrey, Ken Chennault and Ruth Simmons who broke barriers. There were also generations of relatively obscure men and women who treated patients, managed accounts and plotted strategy to acclimate the nation to black leadership.
In the political world a bipartisan effort had been underway to put African Americans into positions of power. Democrats brought us several firsts: Thurgood Marshall, Doug Wilder, David Dinkins, Hazel O’Leary, Ron Brown and Shirley Franklin among others.
Republicans broke the mold in the international arena. Colin Powell was the Jackie Robinson of national security, breaking barriers under the last three GOP administrations. He was National Security Advisor to Ronald Reagan and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff for George H.W. Bush. His term as Secretary of State under George W. Bush, coupled with Bill Clinton’s earlier appointment of Madeleine Albright set up Condoleeza Rice to be the first woman of color in charge of our international profile as National Security Advisor and then Secretary of State. The younger Bush also appointed the first Latino Attorney General.
It’s a proud tradition for the party of Lincoln.
While personalities made headway, issues once considered far-fetched took root in the broad middle of American society. In 2001, a 57 percent majority of Americans opposed gay marriage. Today 55 to 60 percent of Americans support it. Despite the political rhetoric supermajorities of Americans support interracial marriage, immigration reform and universal health care proposals.
Then on November 8, 2016 despite almost three million more voters choosing the first woman major party nominee for president, a minority of Americans living in key battleground states elected Donald Trump president. Trump promised in words and tone to undo the progress of the last 40 years. He scapegoated Latino immigrants; allied himself with white supremacists; and was caught denigrating women and bragging about possible sexually predatory behavior.
Since Election Day, Trump’s cabinet choices have been overwhelmingly white and male, not breaking a single diversity barrier. Trump’s promise to upend the status quo extends to defying the history of both parties and the inclusive trajectory of our society.
At the Women’s March last weekend, millions of Americans of all genders hit the streets to defy the new president. Many had young daughters and sons in tow as they trekked through the streets of the nation’s capitol in pursuit of a country where they could speak truth to those children that they too could grow up to be whatever they want. Equality and inclusiveness are now core American ideals.
Barack Obama was the first person of color to win the White House but Donald Trump is the real Minority President — and he faces a central problem. Once the people have glimpsed the Promised Land, it’s hard to get them to go back to Egypt.

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