From left: Abby Phillip, Yamiche Alcindor, and April Ryan.
Photo Courtesy of CNN.
President Trump has constantly criticized news organizations, labeling them “fake news” an “enemies of the people.” But President Trump last week went too far — as usual.
CNN White House correspondent Abby Phillip asked Trump if he wanted interim U.S. Attorney General Mathew Whitaker to “rein in (Robert) Mueller,” who is investigating Russian involvement in the 2016 election. The President responded by saying to Phillip, “What a stupid question. What a stupid question. But I watch you a lot. You ask a lot of stupid questions.”
Like Phillip, I am a female black journalist. Trump’s response to her displayed the president’s true colors not only to the minority community but specifically to female African Americans. Trump showed how misogynistic and narrow-minded he’s always been. To make a remark degrading the work and hard effort of Phillip who’s written for The Washington Post, worked as a digital reporter and for Politico after graduating from an Ivy League school (Harvard), is a slap in the face.
To call her question — which a majority of the United States wanted to know the answer to — stupid, is to insinuate that she is less than intelligent. The proof of her knowledge is in her work and how far she has gone within her career.
As for the people who mistake Trump’s remarks as ignorance, it’s not. After Trump belittled Phillip he did the same to two other female African American journalists. Trump called American Urban Radio Network’s April Ryan “nasty” and a “loser.” He then preceded to tell PBS Newshour’s Yamiche Alcindor that she asked “a racist question.”
Society tries to offer African American females the short end of the stick, to say the least. If this is not a prime example of how some treat us, then I don’t know what is. This trifecta that President Trump, the leader of the free world who’s supposed to display integrity but instead presents dishonor, caused within a few days, should call the unity of not only female black journalists but every journalist, woman, man and more to stop the berating of President Trump.
As journalists it is our duty to report the truth and to seek out answers, not to be degraded because of our curiosity.
President Trump must be held accountable for his remarks because it’s only reinforcing the idea of white nationalism and the direction the United States is seemingly headed in.