John Legend says Trump believes ‘to his core’ that ‘Black people are inferior’

Singer John Legend says former President Trump is a racist down “to his core.”

Speaking to MSNBC’s Jen Psaki on Sunday, Legend spoke of Trump’s response to the Black Lives Matter protests following the 2020 murder of George Floyd.

“When we protested the killing of George Floyd, he was advocating for the military to shoot us in the streets,” Legend said. “He has made it clear throughout his life that he believes Black people are inferior. Like, he believes that, to his core, in his bones.”

According to then-Defense Secretary Mark Esper, Trump asked authorities in 2020 if they could shoot protesters in the legs during the unrest across the country. Gen. Mark Milley, who was the chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in 2020, also told The Wall Street Journal that Trump’s idea for law enforcement to handle protesters was to “crack their skulls.”

Trump has faced accusations of racism throughout and before his political career. He launched his 2016 campaign decrying immigrants as criminals and “racists,” and earlier this year he hypothesized that “the Black people” appreciate him more because of his criminal indictments.

“And a lot of people said that’s why the Black people like me, because they have been hurt so badly and discriminated against, and they actually viewed me as I’m being discriminated against,” Trump said in South Carolina in February. “It’s been pretty amazing, but possibly, maybe, there’s something there.”

On Sunday, Legend also spoke of how Trump would avoid renting units in his buildings to Black Americans, something the FBI detailed in 20117. 

Legend said Trump “believes in a genetic hierarchy of humanity, and it’s racially determined.”

Trump, who is seeking a second term in the White House, has been working to court Black voters this election cycle. In February, he attended the Black Conservative Federation’s annual gala and he has hinted at choosing a Black running mate.

Trump has also claimed that he was the best president for African Americans. He has pointed to Black unemployment rate under his administration, funding for historically Black colleges and universities and criminal justice reform that passed during his time in office. 

But Legend dismissed these comments, particularly claims of Trump’s success with criminal justice reform, pointing out that Trump had previously called for shoplifters to be shot on the spot.

”He is a tried and true, dyed-in-the-wool racist,” Legend said. “In the core of his being, he is a racist. So I don’t want to hear what he has to say about what he’s done for Black people. He’s done very little for us, and he is, at his core, truly, truly a racist.”

Legend, who campaigned for President Biden in 2020, said he would return to the campaign trail later this year and that the choice between the two candidates is “very clear.”

“I’m old enough to remember when Joe Biden stood on the Senate floor in 1993 and asserted that blacks were ‘predators’ who could not be rehabilitated, or when he said he didn’t want his kids going to school in a ‘racial jungle’ or that Black parents ‘couldn’t read or write,'” Trump campaign senior advisor Lynne Patton said in a statement. “You show me who sincerely believes blacks are inferior to their core — and I’ll show you Joe Biden.”

— Updated at 1:33 p.m.