Donald Trump faces backlash for ''Send a brick to Chuck & Nancy' campaign on social media
Donald Trump started his 2020 presidential campaign funding by calling for donations to buy fake bricks. Those bricks will be sent to Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi.
Donald Trump Jr. promoted the bizarre request from Trump supporters on his Twitter page. People responded by calling out the absurdity of the initiative. The post is found below.
In the post, Trump Jr. linked to an official website. The site asks visitors if they wanted to send a Brick to Nancy Pelosi or Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer. Criticism of the idea was coupled with what persons thought of the wall itself.
In his caption, Trump Jr. outlined the idea of the initiative:
"Since Chuck and Nancy keep stonewalling the President, why don't we send the wall to them, brick by brick, until they agree to secure the border!"
The home page shows what the fake brick would look like. An image of a red brick featured text encouraging persons to text a number and make a donation to fund the border wall.
Towards the bottom was written the claim that enough fentanyl had "entered [the] US to kill every American" in 2018. The website had a goal of 100,000 bricks to be sent to Pelosi and Schumer. Several persons were curious as to where the money for these bricks would come from.
Each brick would set donators back by $20.20 according to Newshub. Of the total collected, 75 percent would go to Trump's campaign. The other 25 percent is set to help the Republican Party.
Others determined that the amount charged was way higher than necessary.
Many people suggested that the money is put towards more formidable causes such as helping hungry children. In a more disturbing analysis, some pointed out that the underlying message of sending bricks to someone is that of violence.
This message contrasted with another that Trump sent to Democrats last week. A last-minute move by the Trump administration was described as making the Democrats "look like fools."
MSNBC's Chris Matthews called out Trump for what he caused last Thursday. The president canceled the military aircraft that Nancy Pelosi was set to travel on for a trip to the middle east.
He sent a letter publicly denying the governmental plane. Since it came last minute, Pelosi and her team were already on their way.
Matthews said:
“[Democrats] were in the bus heading to Joint Base (Andrews). He made them look like fools sitting in the Capitol in the driveway, basically trying to figure out what’s coming next. He caught them in the act as if they were sneaking out of town and made them look stupid."
The move followed Pelosi's letter one day prior in which she suggested that Trump postpone his upcoming State of the Union Address. Pelosi cited security reasons due to the government shutdown.
The shutdown has now been going on for over four weeks. So far, Trump and the Democrats remain at an impasse as the latter denies the $5.7 billion Trump is requesting to build the wall.
Over 800,000 federal employees have been affected since the shutdown began. Many have not been paid or are furloughed. Recently, several workers were ordered to come into work without pay, or they would be fired.
Trump thanked these people in a Twitter post on Tuesday. He called the workers "Great Patriots" before focusing on the wall again. His post received harsh criticism.
He wrote:
"To all of the great people who are working so hard for your Country and not getting paid I say, THANK YOU - YOU ARE GREAT PATRIOTS!"
He continued:
"We must now work together, after decades of abuse, to finally fix the Humanitarian, Criminal & Drug Crisis at our Border. WE WILL WIN BIG!"
Many referenced allegations that Trump used to do the same thing with his former contractors. One person suggested that affected persons use the tweet to show their "landlord, bank, grocery store or whoever else you need to pay."