When President-elect Donald Trump is sworn in as President of the United States inside the Capitol Rotunda, he will take the oath in front of a bust of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. on the federal holiday commemorating Dr. King’s legacy. .
This is an unsettling contrast for some civil rights activists who hope to fulfill the late pastor’s dream of a nonviolent social revolution.
As many Americans observe the peaceful transfer of power in the nation’s capital, events will be held across the country honoring Dr. King and advocating his vision of a just society. Civil rights leaders have mixed feelings about the events and widely condemned Trump’s rhetoric and positions on race and civil rights during his third presidential campaign.
But many leaders, including Dr. King’s own family, see this juxtaposition as a poignant contrast and an opportunity to refocus civil rights efforts in a new political era.
“I’m glad that day happened because it gives a contrast between the United States and the world in the picture. Is this the road you want to go? Or is this the road you want to go?” Bernice King, Jr.’s youngest daughter and CEO of the King Center, said:
King’s daughter said of President Trump, “He will never be the star he wanted to be.” “He has to contend with the legacy of the day, no matter how he manages it and addresses it in his presentation. I hope people give him advice.”
This is the third time in the 40 years since King’s Day became law that it coincides with a presidential inauguration. President Bill Clinton and President Barack Obama also took the oath of office for their second terms on this holiday. Both men praised Dr. King in their remarks. It remains to be seen whether and how President Trump (who falsely claimed his first inauguration drew a larger crowd than Dr. King’s March on Washington) will recognize the day.
“Will he send a message of unity and give everyone a role as president, or will he defend his base and his anti-DEI stance, immigration roundups and cuts to critical parts of public safety? “Do we continue to focus on some of the divisive policies that we’ve had? Do we use the internet through this DOGE process?” said Marc Morial, president of the civil rights organization National Urban League. I asked.
Morial added that landing President Trump’s inauguration on MLK Day represents a “contradiction of values.”
After a week of public and private organizing, giving speeches and strategizing how to respond to the challenges of the incoming administration, many civil rights leaders spent the day commemorating Dr. King’s legacy. will be spent commemorating the.
“These are the best of times and the worst of times,” said Derrick Johnson, president of the NAACP, an organization whose members mentored, worked with and clashed with Dr. King throughout the civil rights movement.
“Our mission remains the same. Our job is to make democracy work for everyone and ensure they have equal protection under the law,” Johnson said. He added that the organization “doesn’t want to assume” the Trump administration can’t be a partner in advancing civil rights and racial justice.
On Wednesday, Johnson and other civil rights leaders met with members of the Congressional Black Caucus at the Capitol to discuss how to work with and oppose the Trump administration. The same day, the National Action Network, a civil rights organization founded by the Rev. Al Sharpton, hosted a breakfast where Vice President Kamala Harris urged participants to stay motivated.
“Our journey is a journey,” she said. “No matter what the outcome of any moment is, we will never lose. Our spirit will never lose, because when that happens, we can’t win.”
The late king’s eldest son, Martin Luther King III, prayed with Harris on stage. Dr. King campaigned for Ms. Harris in the fall, calling her a champion who “speaks to our better angels” and “embodies Dr. King’s legacy.”
Many racial justice advocates plan to mark the holiday by organizing demonstrations, vigils and community service events to prepare for what they see as a hostile regime.
Some groups are considering similarities and differences with the way Dr. King organized in the face of overt white supremacist state and local governments and geopolitical turmoil.
Maya Wiley, CEO of the Civilian Leadership Council, said: “Especially the active and aggressive extremist right-wing groups that are trying to elucidate rights, a sense of common purpose, common problems, or common solutions. “The hostilities are similar in that they are being mobilized.” And human rights. What’s different, Wiley says, is the understanding that “everyone should have a chance.”
Dr. King himself feared that the legal protections he had spent his life working to achieve would not be realized through greater anti-discrimination efforts and social programs. He suggested that to see change, white Americans need to embrace a deeper kinship with black Americans and commit to economic and social solidarity.
A year before his assassination in 1968, Dr. King wrote in his last book that giving black people “what they deserve” often requires “special treatment.”
“I am aware of the fact that this is a troubling concept for many liberals because it contradicts their traditional ideals of equal opportunity, treating people equally according to their individual merits. ,” Dr. King wrote in his 1967 book. Here’s where we go: chaos or community. ” “But today is a day that calls for new thinking and a reassessment of old concepts.”
Dr. King’s advocacy of a “new concept” was followed in the establishment of affirmative action policies in the workplace and schools. Many proponents of diversity, equity, and inclusion policies see such programs as realizing his vision, but the claims have come under intense scrutiny from conservative activists.
Trump’s views on race have been criticized for decades. He was convicted of discriminating against black tenants as a New York real estate agent in the 1980s. He helped promote the “birther” conspiracy theory that Obama was not born in the United States. And from 2015 until the November election, his campaign rhetoric about immigrants and urban communities has been ridiculed as biased.
As president, Trump enacted several criminal justice reform laws praised by civil rights activists, but then proposed a harsh crackdown on racial injustice protests in 2020.
In April, President Trump did not dispute the idea that “anti-white racism” is currently a bigger problem in the United States than systemic racism against black people.
“I think there’s a clear anti-white sentiment in this country, and that shouldn’t be tolerated,” Trump said in an interview with Time magazine.
At the end of his life, Dr. King reflected on his early opposition to civil rights, particularly integrated housing development, interracial marriage, and necessary economic and social planning. He expressed frustration that then-President Lyndon B. Johnson had prolonged the Vietnam War without increasing investment in anti-poverty efforts.
“This is the position of the civil rights movement today: As we climb the unfamiliar slopes of rugged mountains, we make mistakes and stumble, but there is no well-trodden, level path to replace them,” Dr. King wrote. “Along with creative progress, there will be painful setbacks. Our consolation is that only by accepting defeat can we truly taste victory.”
