Legendary NFL players Jim Brown and Ray Lewis met with President-elect Donald Trump Tuesday, Dec. 13, at Trump Tower to discuss economic opportunities in Black communities.
Lewis told reporters that his meeting with Trump was not political and that job creation in urban areas was his only reason for being there. “Job creation is everything. What we are talking about is what entrepreneurship really looks like,” Lewis says. “I think what the Amer I Can program has done for so many years is put us at that place where we have [30,000-40,000] former gang members who have changed their lives.”
Ultimately, Lewis and Brown want to create a partnership between the Amer I Can program founded by Brown and the Trump Administration.
“Forget Black and white. Black and white is irrelevant,” Lewis says. “The bottom line is job creation and economic development in these urban neighborhoods to change the whole scheme for what our kids see [in the future].”
Trump adviser Omarosa Manigault and staunch Trump supporter Pastor Darrell Scott told reporters that the meeting was an attempt to follow through on Trump’s campaign promises to help the Black community.
“The president-elect was very enthusiastic about it and committed to doing it,” Manigault says.
Scott added that this was the first of many meetings. “Trump has given us a verbal commitment and we are going to strategize and the next step is implementation,” he says.
