According to Trump Advisor Stephen Moore, Stay-at-Home Order Protesters Are the 'Modern-Day Rosa Parks'
After encouraging rallies against stay-at-home orders on Twitter, President Trump praised the protestors during his Friday press briefing, describing them as being "very responsible." And conservative commentator Stephen Moore, one of the president's economic advisors, has been taking this praise even further, dubbing the protestors, who risk furthering the spread of a virus that has already claimed more than 30,000 American lives, the "modern-day Rosa Parks."
In his daily pandemic briefing, Trump defended protesters in states like Kentucky and North Carolina who've congregated in defiance of stay-at-home orders to demand that restrictions on businesses and movement be lifted. "These are people expressing their views," Trump told members of the press. "I see where they are and I see the way they’re working. They seem to be very responsible people to me, but they’ve been treated a little bit rough."
Related: Trump Did Not Take Coronavirus Seriously for Weeks
Trump's remarks followed three tweets he published earlier the same day, feeding protest fervor with all-caps missives urging governors to "LIBERATE" Michigan, Minnesota, and Virginia. Due to her criticism of the federal coronavirus response, Michigan's Democratic governor Gretchen Whitmer has become one of Trump's current bétes noires, and the state's rallies, which have found many protestors sporting Trump gear, signal the deep partisan divide over the pandemic.
Moore, who Trump recently named to a bipartisan economic revitalization committee, has lavished the protesters with more effusive and offensive praise. As HuffPost notes, he's made a habit of comparing attendees of anti-stay-at-home rallies—some of whom have been spotted carrying Confederate flags—to Civil Rights hero Rosa Parks.
LIBERATE MICHIGAN!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 17, 2020
"I call these people modern-day Rosa Parks," Moore told The Washington Post. "They are protesting against injustice and a loss of liberties."
"It’s interesting to me that the right has become more the Rosa Parks of the world than the left is," he told CBS News.
In case you're wondering what Moore thinks of protests movements that actually do carry the standard of Rosa Parks' efforts to win the right to life and liberty for Americans of all races, he's made it pretty clear. In a 2016 pro-Trump op-ed for Forbes, he dismissed the Black Lives Matter movement as a "George Soros-funded 'activist' [group]."
Treat yourself to 85+ years of history-making journalism.
Subscribe to Esquire Magazine
You Might Also Like
