Trump's COVID-19 Response, Disdain For Slain Troops Mocked By Performance Artists
Here’s one statue of a racist figure that President Donald Trump may actually like to tear down.
The president, who has a penchant for preserving public monuments to racist historical figures, was on Tuesday taunted by a performance art piece in New York City that depicted him driving a golf cart through a graveyard.
The performance art piece — which was put on by the Trump Statue Initiative, a project conceived by Academy Award-nominated filmmaker Bryan Buckley — featured a mock-Fox News cameraman filming alongside the president’s gilded golf cart, pushed by prominent commentators from the conservative network. It was performed in Manhattan’s Battery Park City area.
The Final Push, coming to you live from NYC. Boosted by Fox News, doing what Agent Orange does best: golfing right over the graves of those who deemed “losers and suckers” for serving our country, and the 180,000+ who perished from COVID-19. #FDT #Vote2020 pic.twitter.com/pYLx9utTSt
— TrumpStatueInitiative (@RelicTrump) September 8, 2020
The tombstones on the set of the performance piece read “In Tragic Memory Of: ‘It Is What It Is’” (referencing Trump’s dismissal of the country’s soaring death toll from COVID-19) and “In Tragic Memory Of: Loser,” a reference to comments confirmed by multiple outlets that Trump reportedly made about fallen American soldiers in 2018.
Trump has denied disparaging the war dead.
VIDEO: A 'living statue' depicting US President Donald Trump driving a golf cart over coronavirus and military themed tombstones while being followed by Fox News anchors is unveiled in Battery Park in New York pic.twitter.com/XvThIBMaBJ
— AFP news agency (@AFP) September 9, 2020
The inscription on the main plinth of the living statue described Trump as the “Destroyer of Civil Rights and Liberties” and suggested his presidency will end in 2020.
The artists also performed a piece titled “THE GIANT VS THE STEALER” on Tuesday.
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The initiative, which did not immediately reply to HuffPost’s request for comment, describes itself on its website as “a way for artists to share their point of view on our 45th President’s most notoriously self-serving, narcissistic, and racist moments ... in a way our President can truly relate to: Realistic, Heroic Statues.
“Yeah, unfortunately, statues and monuments are something the big guy is spending a lot of tax payer dollars protecting right now, while we scramble to find funding to fight surging COVID-19 infections, historic unemployment, and daily racist attacks,” the project’s website adds.
The Trump Statue Initiative has previously performed similar anti-Trump pieces in Portland, Oregon, and Washington, D.C.
"The Poser" at Freedom Plaza, Washington DC by Bryan Buckley#TrumpMeltdown pic.twitter.com/tb6iWw6nNS
— Mimo (@mimosa52862716) July 23, 2020
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This article originally appeared on HuffPost and has been updated.