NYT Op Ed: The Real Problem With Trump's Rallies
The Real Problem With Trumps Rallies
There are a lot of similarities between the president and George Wallace of Alabama. But theres also one big difference.
By Kevin M. Kruse
Mr. Kruse is a professor of history at Princeton.
July 28, 2019
President Trumps political rallies are certainly a spectacle, but a spectacle weve seen before. In both style and substance, the presidents campaign appearances bear strong resemblances to the rallies held a half-century ago by Gov. George C. Wallace of Alabama.
There are a number of similarities between the two politicians rallies. But there is one significant difference and it shows how Mr. Trump remains a greater danger and poses a graver threat to peaceful political discourse, especially as we enter a presidential election campaign.
Like Mr. Trump, Mr. Wallace presented himself as the political champion of aggrieved working-class and middle-class whites. As governor, he embodied the cause of segregationist resistance, literally standing in the schoolhouse door to block the first black students at the University of Alabama and figuratively standing against what he called the civil wrongs bill.
Yet in his repeated campaigns for the presidency between 1968 and 1976, despite todays consensus to the contrary, Mr. Wallace didnt make open appeals to racism. Instead, he couched opposition to the civil rights movement both his own opposition and that of whites in the North and South alike in new terms.
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https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/28/opinion/trump-george-wallace-rallies-the-squad.html