President Donald Trump made a stab against ‘wokeness’ this weekend, although Intelligencer Senior Editor Margaret Hartmann doubts the technical effectiveness of saving a holiday under no threat.
Trump purported to pulling controversial explorer and slaver Christopher Columbus “from the ashes” on Truth Social over the weekend.
“The Democrats did everything possible to destroy Christopher Columbus, his reputation, and all of the Italians that love him so much,” he wrote, and then went on to castigate Democrats who “tore down his statues, and put up nothing but WOKE…” But Columbus, he assured, “is going to make a major comeback.”
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“How is ‘Christopher’ making a ‘major comeback’? Trump didn’t say. Why is the president thinking about an October holiday in the middle of spring? We don’t know. And when was Columbus Day canceled? Well, it wasn’t,” writes Hartmann.
Hartmann notes that Vox describes Columbus as a “homicidal tyrant who initiated the two greatest crimes in the history of the Western Hemisphere, the Atlantic slave trade and the American Indian genocide.” Other publications, like Grist describe a man who threw the babies of Taíno women to hungry dogs.
Trump was likely alluding to the fact that an increasing number of states and cities celebrate Indigenous Peoples Day either alongside or in pointed disregard of Columbus Day, but the federal holiday has never been canceled. Former president Joe Biden was the first president to commemorate Indigenous Peoples Day with a presidential proclamation, but he also released a Columbus Day proclamation. In fact, federal holidays like Columbus Day are designated through congressional legislation, but states can set their own holidays.
But Trump wasn’t “looking to sort out minor details like whether Columbus Day is or is not a federal holiday,” writes Hartmann. “He just wanted to score a conceptual victory against ‘wokeness.’
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Read the entire Intelligencer article here.