FACTS
President Trump signed an executive order Thursday establishing the 1776 Commission in response to The New York Times’ 1619 Project. The 1619 project, launched in 2019 in commemoration of the 400th year since African slaves were brought to the US, “aims to reframe the country’s history by placing the consequences of slavery and the contributions of black Americans at the very center of our national narrative.” President Trump said his commission is in opposition to critical race theory – a concept that he argues disparages, rather than uplifts, minorities – and aims to encourage the true history of America.
“[The 1619 Project] rewrites American history to teach our children that we were founded on the principle of oppression, not freedom…Nothing could be further from the truth. America’s founding set in motion the unstoppable chain of events that abolished slavery, secured civil rights, defeated communism and fascism, and built the most fair, equal, and prosperous nation in human history.”
President Donald Trump
RIGHT
The Right supports 1776. A panel of speakers at the White House Conference on American History noted that the Left likes to point out certain founders’ personal ties to slavery while failing to acknowledge that the “founders fully understood that the Declaration was an anti-slavery document” which would lead to the demise of the institution.
“We have to realize that we are being as a society manipulated by people who have an agenda. And you can’t fight people with an agenda unless you have one also.”
Dr. Ben Carson, Secretary of Housing and Urban Development and retired neurosurgeon
US Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos praised 1776 United Curriculum (separate from Trump’s commission) as an alternative to 1619, stating that a new generation is in need of the knowledge “from whence we came and the need to protect what we have, to build on what we have, to acknowledge where we have to continue to improve. But not to forget what our foundations are.”
The 1776 Commission will protect and preserve our history. We will not allow the coastal elites @nytimes 1619 Project to push its revisionist history onto unsuspecting students. @realDonaldTrump
— Sen. Marsha Blackburn (@MarshaBlackburn) September 18, 2020
LEFT
The Left supports 1619. Freelance writer and content strategist Christina Marface wrote, “According to Trump, education that tells the true, factual history of how our country was built on the backs of its Black residents when they were enslaved is ‘toxic propaganda’ and ‘ideological poison…Literally rewriting history to fit a false, white nationalist narrative and ordering that to be what’s taught in schools? Nothing fascist to see here, folks. Nope, not at all.”
“The 1619 Project is landmark, groundbreaking journalism. It deepened many readers’ understanding of the nation’s past and forced an important conversation about the lingering effects of slavery, and its centrality to America’s story. We are proud of it and will continue this vital journalism.”
Danielle Rhoades Ha, spokesperson for The New York Times
A Catholic Priest and online blogger wrote, “Today’s signing of the Executive Order was yet another Orwellian move to whitewash American history of its 400 years of systemic racism.”
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