Urban League president rips Trump's track record, urges minorities to vote in election

National Urban League President Marc Morial said voters who argue that the U.S. economy was good under former President Donald Trump must have his record confused with that of his predecessor, Barack Obama.

Morial, in West Palm Beach in early May to help the Urban League of Palm Beach County celebrate its 51st anniversary, said Trump mismanaged the coronavirus pandemic and left his successor, President Joe Biden, an economic mess.

"I don't say Donald Trump was responsible for COVID," Morial said in a wide-ranging interview with The Palm Beach Post on state and national topics. "I do say he exascerbated it. He made it worse. He was slow in responding. He denied its existence. He viewed it solely through a political lense. He left a recession."

Morial touched on a number of subjects in the interview, blaming attacks on diversity, equity and inclusion programs on a rise in white nationalism, saying the Biden administration was stymied in its efforts to do more to combat the housing crisis by a single U.S. senator and urging Black and Latino voters to research the track records of the candidates for president before casting a vote.

"I am encouraging people to get all of the facts," Morial said. "Understand the different visions and agendas, not just personalities. And beware of drive-by politics. Drive-by politics is candidates who come and make a lot of promises and rhetoric, and they don't really mean it. How do you know they don't really mean it? Because they have no track record."

Is President Biden losing support among Black and Latino voters?

Polls have consistently shown the race between Biden and Trump to be close, with the former president leading in several key swing states.

Some polling has also shown Biden faces the possibility of losing support among Black and Latino voters. Many topics that are a drag on Biden's overall political support — inflation, immigration, the spiraling death toll of Palestinians from the Israeli strikes on Gaza and the president's advanced age — have also hurt him with minority voters.

For Trump, scooping up more support from Black and Latino voters would be an astonishing accomplishment. He has frequently made comments broadly seen as insulting to both groups, such as when he says illegal migrants — many of whom are Latino — are "poisoning the blood" of the United States and when he says Black voters have empathy for him because he faces criminal prosecution, buttressing the stereotype of Black Americans as prone to criminality.

Perhaps no topic is helping Trump and hurting Biden more than the notion that the U.S. economy has been worsened by the current administration.

Nearly all of the metrics used to measure the economy — job creation, the unemployment rate, gross domestic product — have been better under Biden than they were under Trump. Still, polls regularly show that voters trust Trump more than Biden on the economy.

"It is a complete farce to say the economy was better under Donald Trump than under the first two years of Joe Biden," Morial said. "Why do I say that? Donald Trump let the recession happen. The last three Republican presidents left a recession behind. He's one of the few presidents in American history who had negative job creation."

Indeed, the United States lost about 2.9 million jobs during the Trump administration, according to a statistical analysis of the former president's administration conducted by FactCheck.org. Many of the job losses were tied to the recession brought on by the coronavirus pandemic.

The bullet points of FactCheck's analysis would stand current political thinking on its head. Illegal immigration rose during the Trump administration, as did the trade deficit, the unemployment rate, the murder rate, the federal deficit and the number of people without health insurance.

Urban League president: Housing crisis will be a key issue in upcoming election

Home prices rose by nearly 28%, a preview of the housing crisis that now bedevils the Biden administration.

In April, the median price for a home in Palm Beach County was $525,000, according to Realtor.com. For many buyers, that's a laughably unreachable figure.

Renting hasn't been an easy alternative. In May, apartments.com reported that the average rent in West Palm Beach was $1,981. A renter would have to make more than $79,000 per year to comfortably afford that rent. That's about $15,000 more than the median household income in West Palm Beach, according to U.S. Census Bureau survey figures from 2018-2022.

The Biden administration was set to go big in trying to ease the housing crunch, backing billions in new spending for low-income housing assistance and a variety of other housing iniatives.

Morial said one person stripped away much of that funding.

"People have forgotten this, but Joe Biden proposed, in his original economic plan, a $200 billion to $250 billion commitment to affordable housing and to build housing," Morial said. "We at the National Urban League, working with members of Congress, helped to design and to shape and encourage (the legislation). What happened on the way to the finish line? When it got to the Senate, Senator (Joe) Manchin of West Virginia said, 'I'm not supporting the child tax credit.' He basically did a one-person veto in a 50-50 Senate."

The administration was able to get some $150 million for affordable housing through its Build Back Better initiative, but Morial said the Urban League would like to see both presidential candidates focus more on addressing the problem of housing.

"We need a commitment to confront this long-standing American problem," Morial said.

Urban League president urges a return for diversity, equity and inclusion programs

Colleges and universities had set up a system to combat another long-standing American problem — racial discrimination and racial and ethnic imbalances in student acceptance and treatment.

Diversity, equity and inclusion programs were established to address those problems. Those programs have come under attack in recent years as examples of what some white elected officials describe as reverse discrimination.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis was an early and vociferous opponent of such "DEI programs." He signed legislation banning them at public universities in Florida.

Morial said opposition to DEI isn't rooted in a reasoned difference of opinion on how best to achieve balance and fairness at universities.

"It's the rise of hate," Morial said. "Its root is hate. Its root is, candidly, white nationalism. Its root is that this country is not prosperous enough or big enough for everyone to participate and prosper."

Morial said voters in general — and Black and Latino voters in particular — would be well advised to remember that mindset when election time rolls around.

"What concerns me is the absurd ascertation by some that they will not vote, as though it's a way to send a message," Morial said. "It's a way to be ignored. It's a way to be laughed at. It's a way to give up your power. And I would never, ever endorse, for even a millisecond, the notion of not participating and not voting."

Wayne Washington is a journalist covering West Palm Beach, Riviera Beach and race relations at The Palm Beach Post. You can reach him at wwashington@pbpost.com. Help support our work; subscribe today.

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Urban League president rips Donald Trump, urges minorities to vote