The Final Call

The 'shameful character assassination' of young D.C. politician

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WASHINGTON—Yet another Black public official—this time D.C. Council member Trayon White—has been subjected to yet another shameful character assassination, including calls for his censure by the D.C. Council, because of conduct deemed offensive by Jews in the nation’s capital.

D.C. Council member Trayon White

In mid-March, during a spell of unseasonable, cold, snowy, wintry weather which continued well after the onset of spring, Mr. White accused the Rockefeller and Rothschild families of controlling the climate in inner cities in order to make money for themselves.

That conspiracy theory—like those about “The Illuminati” and “The Boule,” Black groups reportedly controlled by sinister wealthy White families—has been the source of controversy and denials for decades. Some Jewish groups consider references to the Rothschild family as a “placeholder” for all Jews.

While Mr. White condemned both the Rockefellers (who are “WASPS” White Anglo-Saxon Protestants, John D. Rockefeller was a staunch Baptist) and the Rothschilds in his original remarks, the backlash only came from Jews who insist that anything offensive said about any Jewish person is an anti-Semitic insult against all Jews.

As the Passover season approached, Mr. White attended Jewish Seder meals and a kosher breakfast with other city council members and several rabbis, who lectured the first-term politician. There, he apologized for his remarks. He then went for a tour of the U.S. Holocaust Museum, where he was stalked by reporters trailing his group, though Mr. White had insisted that there be no reporters for what he hoped would be a private educational experience.

According to published reports, lawmakers and local Jewish leaders who met over breakfast with Mr. White felt the besieged council member was sincere in his apology for suggesting on Facebook that rich Jews control the weather. Council Chairman Phil Mendelson called that meeting, which included bagels and lox from a local kosher market, “an opportunity for us to learn better about different aspects about bigotry, racism and anti-Semitism,” according to a published report.

After discovering that his tour of the Holocaust Museum was being monitored by news teams, Mr. White left the guided tour, he said for personal, private reflections and to get away from the public glare. The Washington Post then reported that Mr. White abandoned the tour. “It’s definitely been a learning experience for me, but I’ve said my apologies, and I’m done with that,” Mr. White said in a video made public in mid April after criticism of his museum tour. “I’m done apologizing about that. I was sincere.

“I stayed the whole time. I voluntarily went and I took my staff. And I told them ‘No cameras, no media’ because I’m not doing it for that,” he added. “If people don’t think I’m sincere, that’s on them.”

Mr. White represents Ward 8, the poorest ward in the District of Columbia. During the last five years as gentrification by new, wealthy White residents has changed the demographic profile of the formerly majority Black population of  Washington, D.C., once called “Chocolate City” into one where Blacks make up only 49 percent of the city’s population, and where median income in Ward 8—the ward with the heaviest Black concentration—actually fell from $29,000 per family to $24,000. In nearby Ward 2, median income increased from $114,000 to $190,000 according to a report by Rafael Shimunov in the Jewish newspaper Forward.

In Mr. White’s ward—which was represented by former D.C. Mayor Marion Barry from 2001 until his death in 2014—the child poverty rate is 50 percent, while in the “Whitest” district, Ward 3, the child poverty rate is just three percent. Mr. White himself grew up in Ward 8, overcoming his own stifling poverty.

“I don’t think, in fact I know, that you cannot find a council person who has worked so feverishly and diligently to assuage the violence in our city, as well as ensuring that our people are educated,” the Rev. Willie Wilson, Pastor of Union Temple Baptist Church, one of the most prominent congregations in Ward 8, told The Final Call.

“He is involved, in and out of the schools, out in the streets, and I think this situation, this statement, has certainly been overblown, and exaggerated, beyond what it should have. He apologized for his statement, and I thought that was sufficient.”

But then a rash of yellow journalism reported that Mr. White made a $500 contribution to the Nation of Islam Saviours’ Day campaign in Chicago, from his “Constituent Services Fund,” accounts which permit politicians to raise money to be spent on needy local individuals and causes, without reporting that Mr. White is engaged with several projects which directly involve Ward 8 residents and the Nation of  Islam’s Muhammad Mosque No. 4, located in neighboring Ward 7.

Projects such as “fish-fry-Fridays,” is one which began in Ward 8’s Woodland Terrace neighborhood, and which went unreported in sensationalized, reporting about Mr. White’s gift to the Nation of Islam. Fish-fry-Fridays are an effort involving Mosque No. 4 and supported by Mr. White which provides a peaceful atmosphere in which rival neighborhood groups can get along. Also unreported: several members of Mosque No. 4 participate in Mr. White’s “Brotherhood Huddles;” Muslims from Mosque No. 4 are also engaged in the Ward 8 “Neighborhood-to-neighborhood” initiative.

“The community is with him because they know what he does for this community, and they know how hard he’s working,” said the Rev. Wilson. “I just wish that all of the council persons would take the same concern about what’s going on in our communities and our city.”

One Jewish writer agrees. “Many in the D.C. community and the Jewish community need to examine how easily they found themselves mocking a Black man who has devoted his life to the public service of America’s most vulnerable,” Mr. Shimunov wrote in an article headlined: “The Shameful Character Assassination of Trayon White.”

“I understand why people are upset, given the general growth of  White supremacy and anti-Semitism in the country,” Eugene Puryear, a former Statehood-Green Party candidate for an at-large D.C. Council seat told The Final Call. “I also think that the reaction to what has happened though, has been exploited by people who—I don’t think their real interest is dealing with either racism or anti-Semitism.

“I think it’s indicative of the fact that there is a double standard for Black leaders. The only community in America that isn’t really allowed to hold any contradictory and (or) complexity, seems to be Black America,” Mr. Puryear continued.

“We have to be asking ourselves questions about that: why it is that Black leaders seem to be held to a very different standard than leaders of the White community, as it concerns the broader issue of how a politician engages with their community, with their base? And obviously, anyone who knows anything about Washington, D.C., period! The Nation of Islam is a long time institution in the Black community here.”

Despite the sensationalized and exaggerated charges of anti-Semitism with which Mr. White, the Nation of Islam, and the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan were labeled during this episode, Mr. White maintained his solidarity with the Nation of Islam. “They are out front and fighting for the same things I am fighting for,” Mr. White told WUSA-TV9 when asked to defend his association with Mosque No. 4.

“I think what started out as a teachable moment has now taken a dangerous turn,” Joshua Lopez, D.C. Housing Authority member told the AFRO. “There was strong language used to characterize people and that only fans flames of racial and religious division and not building coalitions. There shouldn’t be a political attack on Council member White and using words such as hatemonger, bullying and hateful.

“What is the end game for this? They are trying to destroy Trayon. There is no positive outcome from that approach,” said Mr. Lopez who organized a community rally supporting Mr. White.

Still, the character assassination of  Mr. White and Minister Farrakhan has been relentless. “I was called by a reporter from The Washington Post,” the Rev. Wilson said, “and he asked me, ‘What should be done?’ I told him there was nothing else to do. He had apologized. What do you want him to do? Jump off  the Empire State Building?”

“It’s surprising that people would even be surprised that this would happen,” said Mr. Puryear. “I really think that’s a problem. That we are recognizing some of the double standards in leadership, the result of racism here in America.”

Student Minister Abdul Khadir Muhammad, of Mosque No. 4, has also been a staunch defender of Min. Farrakhan and the young councilman. He blasted those who have attacked Mr. White. During a  recent rally, Min. Abdul Khadir Muhammad challenged those who accused the Minister of anti-Semitism and blasted a Jewish city councilman member who said Min. Farrakhan was unwelcome in the city.

(Final Call staff contributed to this report.)