Coronavirus and xenophobia: 'Blame China' is Trump's 2020 version of 'Build the wall'
https://www.desertsun.com/story/opinion/2020/05/06/trump-blame-china-coronavirus-new-blame-mexico-build-wall-column/3085647001/
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In 2016, Donald Trump fueled his improbable presidential victory with an arsenal of catch-phrases designed to incite and excite the Fox News and Breitbart audience that lives in fear of Americas diversity and inevitable demographic changes. Make America Great Again and Build the Wall were staples of Trumps road show. As the 2020 campaign comes into focus, Trump is looking to recreate the success of 2016 by refreshing his xenophobic rhetoric and channeling it toward China.
The coronavirus has presented the president with an adversary unlike any other he has confronted. It cannot be intimidated by angry tweets. It cannot be dismissed with a nickname. It cannot be diminished by calling it a hoax, as he did in February. And as the death toll rises, while Trumps poll numbers fall, a new, old strategy is taking shape.
Candidate Trump declared in 2016 that Mexico was sending people that have lots of problems to the United States. Theyre bringing drugs. Theyre bringing crime. Theyre rapists, he claimed. He declared that Theyre taking our jobs
Theyre taking our money, creating an us-vs-them dynamic to justify his foray into anti-immigrant hate-speech.
Four years later, Trump and his Republican enablers are offering the country what amounts to a remix of 2016, this time replacing Mexico with China. On April 18th, the president tweeted, China wants Sleepy Joe sooo badly. They want all of those billions of dollars that they have been paying to the U.S. back, and much more. Joe is an easy mark, their DREAM CANDIDATE!