In 2020, Charlotte, North Carolina will be the host city for the Republican National Convention (RNC). In a bold move, on Monday, the Charlotte City Council passed a resolution condemning President Donald Trump’s “racist and xenophobic comments”.
The resolution passed 9-2. According to The Washington Post, all nine of the city council’s Democrats voted for the measure, while the two Republicans on the council opposed it.
The city council narrowly passed the agreement for the 2020 Republican Convention about a year ago.
The legislation comes after days of Trump sending out racist and aggressive tweets about the “Squad,” which consists of four congresswomen of color, including Democratic Reps. Ayanna Pressley (Mass.), Ilhan Omar (Minn.), Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (N.Y.) and Rashida Tlaib (Mich.)
In the infamous tweets, Trump said that the women should “go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came.” The straw that broke the camel’s back was when, during a Trump rally in Greenville, N.C., the Trump supporters chanted “Send her back! Send her back!” in response to Trump’s criticism of Omar.
All of the women are U.S. citizens. Omar was born in Somalia but became a naturalized citizen in 2000.
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Trump has since tried to distance himself from the chant and said that he didn’t support it, but he let the crowd chant for about 13 seconds.
“We may not be able to control what you say, but we’re going to tell you how we feel about it in Charlotte, North Carolina,” said James Mitchell Jr., one of the council members who supported the resolution.
The resolution actually mentions two incidents involving the attacks on the congresswomen, as well as previous remarks, such as Trump’s statement that there were “very fine people” on both sides of the white-nationalist rally in Charlottesville in 2017 where a woman was killed and dozens were injured by Nazi James Fields.
Charlotte is not the only group of politicians to condemn the president ahead of the 2020 Republican Convention.
The House of Representatives last week passed a resolution condemning Trump’s remarks about the four congresswomen and rejected the president’s “racist comments that have legitimized fear and hatred of new Americans and people of color.”
