by Jordan Thompson, Staff Writer
The following story was written by a student on the staff of The Jaguar Times as part of Hilliard Bradley High School’s Journalism Production course.
Donald Trump: some look at this name as a hero to this nation, while others’ opinions oppose this idea greatly. Just two weeks ago, on January 6th, there was a storming of the Capitol Building by numerous Trump supporters. This riot came after Trump lost the 2021 presidential election, and it was nothing less than a violent attack. This was carried out by Trump supporters to hope to overturn the results of the election. The New York Times quoted Congressman Lamb saying “the attack [January 6th], it didn’t materialize out of nowhere, it was inspired by lies, the same lies you’re hearing in this room tonight, and the members who are repeating those lies should be ashamed of themselves’". Mr. Lamb made this statement because he realizes that these rioters are simply angry because of lies they’ve been hearing straight from Donald Trump, that the election was rigged and that he really won, by a “landslide”. Hilliard Bradley government teacher, Mr. Delboccio, stated that the “false information and lies that Trump was giving his hardcore supporters” was exactly what made these riots happen. So, if Trump’s word is this powerful to his diehard supporters, he could’ve made many announcements to them that would help turn this world around in a good way, instead of leading them down a violent path.
2020 was not at all the year we’d all hoped for. Aside from a global pandemic, racial injustice and attacks on African American citizens was a major problem, and one so major that our president got involved. However, his involvement with the Black Lives Matter movement was very different from his involvement in the movement of trying to overturn a loss which he created himself. For example, during the months of June and July of 2020, many protests took place all across the country, and that’s when Trump tweeted out “The National Guard is ready!” and “When the looting starts, the shooting starts”. These tweets were taken very seriously. According to Forbes, in just a fourteen day span of mostly peaceful protests, nineteen people were killed by police.
When asked how the violence at the Capitol building should be handled opposed to the Black Lives Matter protests, senior Kenyon Richardson stated “the people who vandalized the capitol building need to be treated the same as someone would back in June, and there should’ve been way more protection.” In agreement with his statement, there are numerous videos of crowds running over areas policemen had blocked off, and yet only four casualties were reported that day. While any casualty of an American is never good, you have to agree that if it were a different racial group violently rioting that day, there would’ve been a lot more casualties. There has always been a racial issue our country has faced, and the only way we can move past it, is if everyone is treated equally even if it’s for the crimes being committed, the consequences must be the same for everyone, no matter the skin color.
Both protests are now in the past and all we can do is reflect. While one side, fighting for equality for everyone, saw no hope from their current President of The United States to make change, the other side, fighting over a loss, got more gratitude from the President than anyone. Trump released a Twitter video the day of the Capitol Riots, where he stated, “I love you”, in reference to all the violent rioters, who just happen to be his supporters. It is seeming like this is a one sided battle; you’re either with Trump, or he’ll make sure you’ll regret it. If the members of the BLM protests had acted the way these Trump supporters had, they would all be dead, if they could’ve even made it that far.