Former Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker praised President Donald Trump for visiting a church across the street from the White House on Monday after law enforcement used tear gas and shields to clear an area of peaceful protesters.
“Hard to imagine any other @POTUS having the guts to walk out of the White House like this,” Walker tweeted along with a black-and-white photo of Trump striding toward St. John’s Episcopal Church along with Secret Service agents and administration officials.
Trump spoke to reporters from the White House Rose Garden Monday as police cleared protesters from Lafayette Park outside. Trump declared himself “your president of law and order” before walking to St. John’s, which sustained fire damage and vandalism on Sunday. Outside the church, he posed for photos while holding a bible aloft.
Trump’s stroll was intended as a show of strength in the face of protests that have shaken Washington and cities across the nation after the death of George Floyd, an African-American man who died when a Minneapolis police officer held him down with a knee on the back of his neck. The protests have culminated in violence in many cities, including Washington, where demonstrators have clashed with police and set fires outside the White House.
‘Law and order’:Trump returns to 2016 theme as violence spreads after George Floyd death
Though Walker was awed by the boldness of Trump’s walk, Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde told CNN she was “outraged” by it.
“The president just used a Bible, the most sacred text of the Judeo-Christian tradition, and one of the churches of my diocese without permission as a backdrop for a message antithetical to the teachings of Jesus and everything that our churches stand for,” she said.
Many commentators have similarly accused the president of attacking the protesters – 30 minutes before Washington’s curfew began – for the sake of a photo-op. And they were quick to heap scorn on Walker for his tweet.
“You’ve got a really messed up idea of what courage looks like,” said NBC News legal contributors Katie Phang said in reply to Walker’s tweet.
‘I am outraged’:DC bishop denounces Trump’s church visit after police clear protesters with tear gas
“Such bravery,” tweeted historian and author Kevin Kruse along with a photo of Trump flanked by police officers in riot gear.
“Is this a joke?” asked former Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo. “There were police and Secret Service everywhere. They moved a peaceful crowd with tear gas and rubber bullets for him to take a phony picture. And you think that showed bravery? Sick.”
“There’s nothing brave about this man. EVERYTHING he does and says comes from a place of fear,” tweeted actress and activist Alyssa Milano.
In response to Walker’s inability to think of any other president who could have matched Trump’s bravery, CNN’s Jake Tapper pointed out two previous White House occupants, Dwight Eisenhower and George H.W. Bush, served in World War II.
“Ike was Supreme Commander of the Allied Expeditionary Force in Europe and JFK and Bush Sr were war heroes during WWII,” Tapper noted. More than two dozen other presidents also served in the military during wartime.
“Somewhere, Ulysses Grant, Dwight Eisenhower, Teddy Roosevelt, George Washington, Andrew Jackson, Zachary Taylor, and Abraham Lincoln are looking at this tweet, and scratching their heads,” said journalist Casey Michel.
Rory Cooper, who served as communications director for former House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., said, “This moment will memorialize one of the darkest decisions by a modern president, and this tweet will memorialize a larger problem within the party.”
At least one user noted that former President Richard Nixon once left the White House and spoke with people protesting the Vietnam War at the Lincoln Memorial.
Others shared footage of occasions when former President Barack Obama walked out of the White House and interacted with people on the streets.
Here were some other reactions to Walker’s tweet:
Source Article from https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2020/06/02/scott-walker-praises-trumps-courage/3122306001/
Comments