“We can’t react to every statement, every Tweet that the President feels necessary to put out,” says actor and activist Danny Glover following alleged racist statements by President Trump.
Democratic U.S. Senator Dick Durbin confirmed that Mr. Trump referred to Haiti, El Salvador, and Africa as ****hole countries. The reported statement prompted outrage and demands for a Presidential apology from lawmakers and officials in the U.S., Africa and elsewhere.
Glover was in Tuscaloosa to speak at the Legacy Awards Banquet, which is part of a weekend of events sponsored by the University of Alabama, Stillman College, Shelton State Community College, and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference to celebrate the life of Dr. Martin Luther King, Junior.
“I think it’s important for us to understand that we have to be the architects of our own rescue,” said Glover when asked to respond to Mr. Trump’s reported comments. “And I say that ‘we, the people.’ The idea of ‘we, the people,’ is still a profound statement…a statement that has not been realized in its entirety. But we have to find ways to go beyond that, and begin to build the kind of life, the kind of communities, those communities of love, the communities of respect, the communities of compassion. We have to build those communities. That’s what I would say to that.”
This Monday, Glover will be honored for his philanthropic and humanitarian efforts at the NAACP Image Awards. The actor and producer will receive the “President’s Award.”