The Black Historical past Month reception held on the White Home on Thursday had the entire pomp of celebrations previous. Friends sipped champagne and snacked on lamb chops and collard greens. The group delighted of their invites, snapping selfies. And when President Trump walked out alongside one of many best Black athletes on the planet, Tiger Woods, the group roared with their telephones within the air.
However the dissonance within the East Room was jarring.
Mr. Trump might have praised the contributions of Black People on Thursday, however he has spent the weeks since his inauguration eviscerating federal packages aimed toward combating inequality in America. He has recommended that efforts spurred by the civil rights motion had made victims out of white individuals. He blamed a lethal aircraft crash over the Potomac River on variety packages within the Federal Aviation Administration.
On Thursday, Mr. Trump tried to indicate appreciation to the Black group by extolling these he sees as consultant of Black American progress.
“Let me ask you,” Mr. Trump stated as he started his remarks, “is there anyone like our Tiger?”
Mr. Trump and Mr. Woods are actively engaged in negotiations in quest of a profitable golf merger deal, and the president referred to Mr. Woods repeatedly throughout his roughly 20-minute tackle. Mr. Woods wasn’t the one Black athlete to get a shout-out; Mr. Trump additionally heralded Muhammad Ali and Kobe Bryant.
The president, who made positive aspects with Black voters in 2024, informed the group of greater than 400 company that “we’re going to work with you.”
Throughout his remarks, Mr. Trump made little reference to points which have traditionally plagued the Black group, reminiscent of elevated poverty charges, the wage and wealth hole between Black and white People, and gun violence. He promised to place statues of Black People in a brand new “Nationwide Backyard of American Heroes.”
Amongst these to be honored was Prince Estabrook, an enslaved man and the primary Black American to spill blood within the Revolutionary Warfare, together with Harriet Tubman, Rosa Parks, Billie Vacation and Aretha Franklin — and possibly Mr. Woods someday, Mr. Trump stated.
The president additionally used a chunk of Black historical past — the 12 months that the primary enslaved Africans arrived in America, which has gained widespread recognition in recent times — to take photographs at his political opponents.
“The final administration tried to cut back all of American historical past to a single 12 months, 1619,” Mr. Trump stated. “However underneath our administration, we honor the indispensable function Black People have all the time performed within the immortal explanation for one other date, 1776.”
The feedback highlighted Mr. Trump’s alignment with conservatives who derided a mission revealed by The New York Occasions known as the “1619 Venture,” which examined the historical past of slavery in the US and defined how America was constructed on the backs of enslaved individuals. Throughout his first time period, Mr. Trump created the 1776 Fee in response to the mission, which he lately resurrected.
Thursday’s occasion went ahead regardless of rumblings that the White Home may select to not maintain a Black Historical past Month celebration this 12 months, as authorities businesses shuttered such occasions in mild of Mr. Trump’s govt orders.
Mr. Trump’s press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, skirted a query final month about whether or not the White Home deliberate to mark the event. “We are going to proceed to rejoice American historical past and the contributions that each one People, no matter race, faith or creed, have made to our nice nation,” Ms. Leavitt stated.
Mr. Trump’s critics stated Thursday’s occasion was a obvious instance of the president’s celebrating and undermining Black historical past on the similar time.
“This White Home celebrating Black historical past is like asking a cow to serve steak,” stated Derrick Johnson, the president of the N.A.A.C.P., the nation’s oldest and largest civil rights group, which didn’t obtain an invite to this 12 months’s occasion.
“He’s holding a celebration on the similar time that he’s banning the individuals from studying about historical past and civil rights,” Mr. Johnson added. “I’m deeply troubled by the truth that — because the younger youngsters say — he’s enjoying in our face.”
White Home officers have defended Mr. Trump’s campaign towards variety, fairness and inclusion packages, which had been aimed toward countering the affect of discriminatory insurance policies confronted by girls, Black individuals, individuals with disabilities and others in minority teams. The administration says the packages are wasteful and quantity to reverse discrimination.
Trump administration officers have argued that the orders rolling again D.E.I. efforts weren’t meant to suppress Black historical past however to advance racial progress right into a “colorblind” society. The administration has additionally stated it’s aligning federal coverage with the Supreme Courtroom’s 2023 ruling prohibiting race-conscious admissions practices in schools.
Simply hours earlier than the Black Historical past Month reception, Stephen Miller, Mr. Trump’s deputy White Home chief of employees for coverage, disparaged D.E.I. insurance policies and stated his transfer towards them is amongst Mr. Trump’s largest accomplishments in his first month in workplace.
“This nation has been plagued and crippled by unlawful discrimination, variety, fairness and inclusion insurance policies,” Mr. Miller stated. “It strangled our economic system. It has undermined public security. It has made each facet of life tougher, extra painful and fewer secure.”
Black Republican leaders in attendance included Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina and Scott Turner, the secretary of the Division of Housing and City Improvement. Additionally in attendance had been various conservative influencers, together with the journalist Sage Steele and the lawyer Leo Terrell. Attendees wore “Make America Nice Once more” hats of varied colours, and one hat was emblazoned with the phrases “MAGA Black.”
The Rev. Steven Perry, a pastor from Michigan, who supported Mr. Trump after voting for Mr. Biden in 2020, stated that he was honored to attend the occasion. He stated that he supported Mr. Trump as a result of he was a frontrunner who adopted by way of on his guarantees.
“No one can take away what we’ve achieved on this nation — it’s evident,” Mr. Perry stated of Black People. “We’ve bought to study that we bought loads to be happy with, whether or not any person acknowledges us or not.”
“We want leaders who assist us do what we have to do, not placate our feelings,” he stated.
Mr. Trump’s Black Republican supporters have additionally defended his ways.
Consultant Byron Donalds, Republican of Florida and a stalwart defender of Mr. Trump’s, stated in a tv interview final month that he took problem with the idea of “fairness” that had been the centerpiece of President Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s agenda, which he stated “places your demographic standards on the entrance of the road earlier than your precise {qualifications}.”
“I feel on the finish of the day, everyone needs to guarantee that people who find themselves getting jobs are certified to do them,” Mr. Donalds stated. “That’s most essential. However you possibly can’t put simply variety for variety’s sake forward of {qualifications}. It’s not 1972. It’s 2025. We’re in a unique section in the US of America.”
Dr. Courtney R. Baker, who attended Biden White Home occasions that included a screening of a film about Emmett Until, stated a single occasion didn’t exempt Mr. Trump from civil rights work nonetheless wanted right this moment. She equated his organizing of a reception celebrating Black Historical past Month to a tv collection that reserves one episode to discover and clear up racism, slightly than “attending to the realities of the situations of African American life.”
“This administration is giving a token acknowledgment to Black life however may be very shrewdly, I’d say deviously, distancing that from the information on the bottom,” stated Dr. Baker, a professor on the College of California, Riverside.
Damon Hewitt, the president and govt director of the Attorneys’ Committee for Civil Rights Beneath Legislation, stated that the occasion was like “rubbing salt within the wound.”
“What he appears to be celebrating is the help he believes he obtained from Black supporters, so once more, it’s about him, not about us,” Mr. Hewitt stated. “It’s like a merciless joke.”
