Jay-Z Vs Trump: On Trump’s Treatment Of African-Americans
President Trump loves a Twitter battle. Last Sunday he took to Twitter to counter comments Jay-Z made on “The Van Jones Show” in a round of Jay-Z vs Trump.
One Sunday President Donald Trump President’s tweeted a response to Grammy award-winning rapper and business powerhouse, Jay-Z after he spoke about the president on the premiere of CNN’s “The Van Jones Show” on Saturday.
“Somebody please inform Jay-Z that because of my policies, Black Unemployment has just been reported to be at the LOWEST RATE EVER RECORDED!” Trump tweeted Sunday morning.
Indeed, the latest unemployment rate for African-Americans is 6.8 percent, the lowest rate in the 45 years that the statistic has been tracked. By comparison, the rate is 3.7 percent for white people and the national average is 4.1 percent.
Both the African-American rate and the overall rate have declined steadily since 2010, long before Trump took office. Unemployment for the group is lower than those recorded during the tail end of the Clinton administration in 2000.
Asked by Van Jones whether it’s OK for Trump “to say terrible things but put money in our pockets” amid Trump’s prior claims that unemployment for African-Americans has dropped, Jay-Z said no, “because it’s not about money at the end of the day. Money doesn’t equate to happiness. It doesn’t. That’s missing the whole point.”
“Everyone feels anger, but after the anger it’s really hurtful because he’s looking down on a whole population of people and he’s so misinformed because these places have beautiful people,” he told show host, Van Jones.
Jay-Z was referring to allegations that Trump made derogatory comments about Haiti, and African nations, at a meeting earlier this month about the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program. Several senators were present at the time, with some confirming the remarks while others denied that it happened.
The alleged remarks sparked outrage and criticism both in the U.S. and overseas.
“You treat people like human beings. That’s the main point,” Jay-Z said. “It goes back to the whole thing — ‘treat me really bad and pay me well.’ It’s not going to lead to happiness, it’s going to lead to, again, the same thing. Everyone’s going to be sick.”
“I mean, he could have come in and done stuff that reversed that trend. He could have come in and done terrible things. And he didn’t. So there was a bull market under Obama. He kept that going, maybe accelerated it. Unemployment was coming down. He kept that going. Great. But you’re not listening to the voices of the black community who say that’s not enough to make up for S-hole countries. That’s not enough to make up for insulting black football players, saying all of our communities are terrible.”
This isn’t the first time Trump has bashed a hip hop icon.
He fired back at Snoop Dogg last March, after his music video for “Lavender” featured the rapper shooting a clown who resembled the President.
“Can you imagine what the outcry would be if @SnoopDogg, failing career and all, had aimed and fired the gun at President Obama? Jail time!” Trump tweeted last March.
He was mum, however, to repeated criticism from rapper Eminem, who told Billboard last week that a “f—–g turd would have been better as a president.”
Jay-Z received the Industry Icon award from the Grammys Saturday evening, and was nominated for eight Grammy Awards including record of the year and album of the year at the 60th Annual Grammy Awards, which aired on Sunday on CBS.
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