Opinion | Politics

Steve Inskeep: Donald Trump channels renowned Indian fighter

Wednesday, February 17, 2016

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaks at a rally in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, on February 11, 2016. Photo from Twitter

Echoing a view first laid out by activist Suzan Shown Harjo, Steve Inskeep, the author of Jacksonland: President Andrew Jackson, Cherokee Chief John Ross, and a Great American Land Grab, compares Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump to Andrew Jackson, the firebrand who forced Indian nations from their homelands in the southeast:

Jackson had a captivating style, and not just because of his wild hair. He did what he wanted, and demanded respect. In an 1806 duel, he shot and killed a man who had insulted him in a newspaper. Mr. Trump’s Twitter broadsides at his critics are gentle by comparison.
Like Mr. Trump, Jackson made his fortune in real estate. He bought and sold vast tracts of Southern land in concert with wealthy friends. If desirable land was owned by Indians, Jackson bullied or bribed them into selling it cheap.
And again like Mr. Trump, a former Democrat and independent, Jackson did not worry about consistency. Having joined the nation’s wealthy elite, he ran for president as an opponent of wealthy elites. He defended liberty while operating a personal empire of cotton plantations using hundreds of enslaved black laborers.
Needless to say, Jackson and his Democratic Party enforced a certain idea of America — an America for white people. Jackson was personally cordial to people of other races, but their rights did not concern him. When white Southerners grew tired of Indian nations in their midst, Jackson forced them into internal exile in the West. He could have defended this policy using a Trump phrase: “We either have a country or we don’t.”

Get the Story:
Steve Inskeep: Donald Trump’s Secret? Channeling Andrew Jackson (Indian Country Today 2/17)