Democrats take shots at Trump after speech at SC’s Benedict College
As 2020 Democratic hopefuls took the stage at Columbia’s Benedict College on Saturday, the specter of President Donald Trump and the words he spoke on the same campus the day before hung over them.
Democrats expressed outrage that Trump was allowed to speak at the historically black college and that he was given an award for his work on the First Step Act by event organizers, the 20/20 Bipartisan Justice Center. All this came days after he compared House Democrats’ impeachment inquiry to “lynching.”
U.S. Sen. Kamala Harris told a crowd of Benedict students and community members Saturday she couldn’t believe event organizers would invite “someone who dares, dares to use the world ‘lynching’ with the blood that has been poured on the soil of South Carolina and so many places.”
Harris’ outrage was so strong that she initially vowed not to participate in Saturday’s event, kicking off an avalanche of events that led to Columbia Mayor Steve Benjamin, a co-host of the original candidate forum, announcing that he and Benedict College were taking over the weekend’s events and removing the 20/20 Bipartisan Justice Center as a sponsor of the event.
During Friday’s speech, Trump touted his First Step Act, a bipartisan criminal justice reform bill that resulted in the release of thousands of federal inmates and the betterment of conditions for many more. Trump also took swings at President Barack Obama’s administration, the news media and his Democratic opponents.
Talking to reporters after speaking at the Benedict forum Saturday, Harris said she initially boycotted the event because students were not invited to Trump’s speech and were told to stay in their dorms.
In a marked shift from Trump’s speech on Friday, on Saturday students were given the opportunity to ask questions of the Democratic presidential hopefuls.
“To exclude those students from a conversation with the president of the United States ... was wrong,” Harris told reporters.
She added that students at historically black colleges or universities like Benedict often experience first-hand the reasons why the criminal justice system needs reformed, like racial profiling and use of excessive force by police.
“It’s about everybody being here,” Harris said. “This is such an important conversation.”
The senator from California was not the only one enraged at Trump’s comments at Benedict College Friday.
Former Vice President Joe Biden took on Trump’s claims that he and his administration had done more than any other to improve the lives of African Americans.
“I understand he had things to say, like he’s done more for African Americans than President Obama. Whoa. I mean, come on,” Biden said.
In a more serious tone, Biden later added, “I won’t stand by and let President Trump say lies about his record.”
Biden maintained that Trump’s words and actions had more of a negative impact on the nation than a positive one.
“Let me just set the record straight ... President Trump has fanned the fuels of white supremacy,” Biden said.
U.S. Sen. Cory Booker, another Democratic presidential hopeful, said Trump was using the college in Columbia to create the appearance that members of the African American community supported his presidency.
An AP poll from early October said only 4% of African Americans believe Trump’s actions have been good for African Americans in general. About 81% said he’s made things worse, according to the poll.
“Donald Trump used this campus as a backdrop,” Booker said.
Booker said event organizers let Trump speak “unchecked” for nearly an hour. He also said Trump has a history of siding with white supremacists and backing rumors that President Barack Obama wasn’t born in the United States. Booker also cited Trump’s media campaign taking out full-page newspaper ads in support of the death penalty after the 1989 murder of a jogger in Central Park. The Central Park Five — five teens who were charged and convicted of attacking and killing the woman, were later exonerated through DNA evidence, but Trump has said he still believes they are guilty.
Booker said the president’s words Friday were “offensive” and “insulting.”
“This was the person who was on the stage fueling lies about his record and this country,” Booker said.
U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, of Vermont, also kicked off his speech with criticizing the president.
“The word justice and Donald Trump do not go into the same sentence,” Sanders said.
Mayor Pete Buttigieg, of South Bend, Indiana, chalked up Trump’s words Friday to ignorance.
“He does not understand what reform is about,” Buttigieg said.
On the other hand, former U.S. Rep. John Delaney said he wasn’t “in the business of criticizing other candidates.”
“If people want to give the president recognition for signing (the First Step Act) into law, it doesn’t bother me,” Delaney said.
Most candidates also addressed what many of them called the “elephant in the room”: the removal of the 20/20 Bipartisan Justice Center from the event sponsors list. Nearly all of them praised Benjamin and Benedict College leaders for taking over the forum.
“I want to thank them really for taking control of this conference in a most significant way,” Booker said.
During an interview with CNN Tuesday as 2020 hopefuls spoke on stage, Benjamin said he didn’t want the weekend’s events to be wholly focused on Trump.
“I was more concerned that the words that everyone was hearing on the stage were healing words,” Benjamin said.
After throwing their initial punches at Trump, most candidates agreed, transitioning to laying out their plans for policing and incarceration reform.
“Now, its time to finish the job,” Biden said. “There’s a lot more to do.”
This story was originally published October 26, 2019 at 5:58 PM.
