After penning an open letter to Trump earlier on MLK Jr. Day, T.I. has a lot more to say. In a series of videos that he posted to Instagram, which you can watch in full above, T.I. speaks on black celebrities meeting with President-Elect Trump and how it helps normalize him. T.I. sees Kanye as a representative of black youth and a way to parley approval for the Trump camp, Steve Harvey as a representative of black women, and he points to the star power of Ray Lewis and Jim Brown as further examples of this.
“Kanye what the f*ck you doing man?” he asks, before admonishing Steve Harvey, saying that he should know better. Tip further clarifies that he thinks it’s okay to meet and discuss things with people who give you basic human respect and who aren’t in support of hate groups who are adamantly against the advancement of your people, two categories he argues that Trump clearly doesn’t fall into.
He closes out by chastising Martin Luther King Jr.’s son Martin Luther King III for meeting with Trump on his father’s birthday. Considering Trump kicked off the weekend of his father’s birthday by trashing one of his contemporaries, John Lewis, the meeting does feel a bit like whiplash.
T.I. repeatedly brings up the “Willie Lynch” trope, which is a speech that may or not be an actual historical event, that features a slave owner telling other slave masters that the way to control slaves best is by pitting them against one another — Tip is implying that by diving the allegiance of black Americans Trump and his crew will control all of them.
Later in the day, the Atlanta rapper posted a clip of Kasim Reed, the mayor of his city, citing Trump’s own praise of the city — John Lewis’ congressional district specifically — where he opened two towers a decade ago:
Here’s T.I.’s thoughts on Kasim’s speech:
Well Kasim… Maybe it’s our predominantly black Govt. Or our thriving community of self sufficient Black athletes,rappers,producers, actors, DJ’s, directors, celebrities, executives, real estate developers & entrepreneurs who’ve worked their way to Multi-Millionaire-Legendary status in spite of the narrow-minded oppressive thoughts of our neighbors only 45mins-1hr away in any given direction. Maybe it’s because we’ve created our own platforms & vehicles that empowered US & allowed US to bypass their approvals & validations. Or maybe he was confronted with an uncomfortable truth that put his back against the wall & he just blurted out (or tweeted out) the first piece of BS his thumbs could muster. Either way… Congressman John Lewis, I stand with you…. as YOU ALL should!!! #ThatWay #ThisOurCity
So in case he hadn’t made his position clear before, T.I.’s views on America’s next president are crystal clear.
