After President Donald Trump’s “shithole” comment concerning African, Haitian and El Salvadorian immigrants, it’s hard to believe how anyone is still supporting him and his blatantly racist ideals.
Leave it up to Christian Evangelicals, more than 80 percent of whom voted for Trump in the 2016 election, to defend the president’s words, however.
During a recent appearance on MSNBC’s “AM Joy” with Joy Reid, South Carolina pastor Mark Burns, who is African-American, used none other than a verse from the “Good book” to try and justify what Trump had said. His scripture of choice this week was from 1 Timothy 5:8, which reads, “Anyone who does not provide for their relatives, and especially for their own household, has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.”
Here, the pastor tried to argue that caring for people in need from other nations as well as those in need here at home are mutually exclusive, a far reach in defending the president’s “America first” mentality.
“The fact of the matter is we do love thy neighbor, we do help, we don’t leave people destitute,” said Burns, who’s also a member of the Donald Trump Evangelical Advisory Council. “[But those millions of dollars could be coming to America to help other Black people, other minorities in our own country.”
Reid, a self-professed church girl, clapped back with a Bible verse of her own, quoting Isaiah 10:1-2, which states, “Woe to those who make unjust laws, to those who issue oppressive decrees, to deprive the poor of their rights and to withhold justice from the oppressed of my people, making widows their prey and robbing the fatherless.”
“You talked about Haiti specifically being a country that is not caring for its own people, and that it has a government that’s corrupt, and a system that’s broken,” she tells Burns. “…So how can you as a man of God justify sending people back to such a country?”
Their on-air debate became heated from there, as Burns tried his darndest to deflect Reid’s questions, deny the president’s racist comments, and refused to let the host get a word in edgewise on her own show. After repeatedly trying to ask Burns a question, Reid abruptly ended her segment, booting the pastor from the show.
“I’m going to give you one more chance to answer my question and then you’re going to be done here, because you’re actually wasting my time when you talk over me,” Reid said.
“Joy, you’re wasting my time when you’re not talking about Americans,” Burns quipped back.
Their verbal tiff didn’t end there, however. Burns later posted a 14-minute rant to his Twitter page Saturday suggesting that Reid “move back to #Haiti since she cares more for Haitians than Black Americans here in Poverty …”
#AMJoy should moved to #Haiti since she cares more for Haitians than Black Americans here in Poverty… https://t.co/xtcBTqyKI5
— Pastor Mark Burns (@pastormarkburns) January 13, 2018
Reid wasn’t here for the pastor’s comments either and managed to get the last word in their argument. The MSNBC host followed Burn’s rant with another on-air schooling about the Bible and a brief history lesson on Haiti.
Watch her final comments below:
https://youtu.be/oLwh_gciC4E
