By Brian Harris, Staff Writer
Had you told me two years ago that the President of the United States of America would be arguing with legendary rapper Jay-Z on Twitter, I would have laughed right in your face. Well, I suppose life is stranger than fiction.
On January 28, President Donald Trump tweeted out what seemed like an angry rebuttal to…something. “Somebody please inform Jay-Z that because of my policies, Black Unemployment has just been reported to be at the LOWEST RATE EVER RECORDED!” the tweet reads.
Which, of course sent many to investigate what exactly the commander-in-chief was upset about now, which lead many to, unsurprisingly, CNN. Their latest news program The Van Jones Show had just premiered it’s very first episode the day before, with its promising host starting off his new series with an extended interview with rapper Jay-Z.
Judging from the tone of Trump’s tweet, one who hadn’t seen the premiere could assume Jay-Z had said some decidedly negative things about the president.
Van Jones himself has fired back at the President with his follow up tweet on Jan. 28, “Someone needs to inform @realdonaldtrump that I ALREADY asked Jay Z whether black employment figures redeem Trump’s presidency. And Jay’s answer last night on the #VanJonesShow was POWERFUL !!!”, with a link to a clip from the interview, where Jay-Z indeed does talk about the recent dip in unemployment.
For those who don’t know, under Trump this past December, black unemployment had hit a record low of 6.8 percent. Something that Trump has happily used as a talking and bullet point for any speech, tweet or public appearance he may have to make. So, naturally, Van Jones brought the topic up in his interview with the 21-time Grammy award winner.
“Let me ask you this,” Van began, “he [Trump] is somebody who is now saying look, I’m growing, I’m dropping black unemployment…does he have a point?” To which Jay-Z immediately answered back with “no, because its not about money at the end of the day.
Money doesn’t equate to like, happiness, it doesn’t. You’re missing the whole point, you treat people like human beings.” And while to many voters, that statement is questionable, it’s clear that Jay-Z has been “informed” of the black unemployment figures, and that his priorities are elsewhere. In the social issues and troubles that Trump has infamously caused since the election. Its worth noting that January’s black unemployment figures have skyrocketed an almost full percent, to 7.7 percent.
Now, with hindsight, Trump’s argument makes little to no sense, while Jay-Z’s points all still matter. There isn’t any new statistic that will make those social issues seem trivial or reduce Jay-Z’s argument to nothingness like this dramatic increase does for Trump’s. Overall, this feud, if nothing else, has spotlighted Jay-Z as the latest celebrity to seemingly eclipse our commander-in-chief in terms of both visible intelligence and dignity.
Trump very clearly didn’t watch the interview himself, if he had he would have known that the unemployment dip was brought up by Van Jones. A better man would have responded to Jay-Z’s criticism through self-reflection or not brought it up at all. Trump’s deflective response says nothing more than what the world already knows, that he is a president that is perfectly willing to yell at Jay-Z on twitter. And that says everything by itself, doesn’t it?