In an interview with Politico, Carson said that Obama was “raised white”, and that Obama’s claim to understanding the black experience is “a bit of a stretch”.
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“He’s an “African” American”.
The neurosurgeon-turned-politician questioned Obama’s black “experience”, alluding to the president’s white mother. Though Carson may have had a more hard upbringing, you would imagine Obama taking offense to the notion that he was “raised white”.
Carson, who was born and raised in Detroit, responded, “You know, I did not – I mean, like most Americans, I was proud that we broke the color barrier when he was elected, but I also recognize that his experience and my experience are night-and-day different”.
Politico’s Glenn Thrush asked Carson about his reaction to Obama becoming the first black president.
“Many of his formative years were spent in Indonesia”, he says. “I think the way that I’m treated, you know, by the left is racism”, he said.
Carson denies any racism in the Republican Party, pointing the finger of blame on those who can’t accept a conservative black voter. “And I don’t think it has anything to do with race”, he said. Thanawala spoke to a few of Obama’s black classmates from their time at the private school they attended in Honolulu, and found that everyday racism was prevalent.
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“Being calm and relaxed is actually a sign of strength, not weakness”, Carson said. “And if you don’t think that way, you’re “Uncle Tom”, you’re worthy of every disgusting epithet they can come up with; whereas, if I weren’t black, then I would just be a Republican”. “He wanted to know things like ‘How are you going to train me?’ and ‘What am I going to learn?'” “You can say that when you’re a private citizen, and you’re technically accurate”. “I know that. I haven’t experienced that”, he added. But recently, he’s been running ads against affirmative action in SC and condemning black crime as “a crisis” that only he knows how to tackle.
