Donald Trump is a racist and promotes racist conspiracy theories

Before and during his first term as president, Donald Trump has expressed racist views, emboldened racists and spread racist conspiracy theories. Joe Biden will be better for race relations because he could not be worse than Donald Trump. When launching his political career, Trump accused Mexico of sending “drugs”, “crime” and “rapists” to the US^[1] and during his presidency, there have been well-documented stories of parents being separated from their children and migrants being kept in dangerous conditions on the US-Mexico border.^[2] In office, Trump introduced a travel ban on predominantly Muslim countries, citing “terrorism and extremist movements”, and significantly reduced the number of refugees taken in by the US.^[3] Trump also promoted the ‘birther’ conspiracy theory about Obama’s citizenship, suggesting that Obama was not born in the US and so was not eligible to serve as president, even after his birth certificate was released by the White House in 2011.^[4] In the lead up to the 2020 election, Trump has made similar claims about Joe Biden’s running mate Kamala Harris, suggesting “she doesn’t meet the requirements” to serve.^[5] He also told four influential congresswomen of colour known as ‘The Squad’ to “go back” to the “totally broken and crime infested places from which they came” despite three of them being born in the US and the fourth arriving as a refugee and receiving US citizenship as a teenager.^[6] More recently, Trump has not condemned white supremacists and right-wing militias as strongly as he should. After a white supremacist killed a counter-protester at a rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, Trump said there were “very fine people on both sides”.^[1] In a recent election debate, he refused to condemn white supremacy and told the Proud Boys, an all-male far-right group, to “stand back and stand by”.^[7] These actions inflamed racial tensions and divided Americans. Trump is unapologetic and his victory would lead to four more years of divisive leadership. Trump is a cause of racial tensions, and Biden's presidency is needed to repair the situation.