Trump, 1 — flying monkeys, 0

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(Here’s the backstory)

Harris campaign, Whitmer and the media tar the small Michigan town Trump’s visiting Tuesday as racist

ANN ARBOR, Mich. — The Harris campaign — along with media allies — has made an extraordinary claim, implying Donald Trump’s Tuesday visit to discuss crime and safety in Howell, Mich., is motivated by racism.

And Howell residents are mystified.

Gov. Gretchen Whitmer also denounced the former president’s coming speech — and suggested the city in the state she represents is racist — Monday at the Democratic National Convention, telling ABC, “Anyone who’s doing a little bit of research might have said, ‘That’s really a bad idea, look at the optics.’ You’re showing up where the KKK was just at the same time you’re in Michigan.”

“The racists and white supremacists who marched in Trump’s name last month in Howell have all watched him praise Hitler, defend neo-Nazis in Charlottesville, and tell far-right extremists to ‘stand back and stand by,” said Kamala Harris’ Michigan spokeswoman Alyssa Bradley.

“Trump’s actions have encouraged them, and Michiganders can expect more of the same when he comes to town.”

A Washington Post article boosted this narrative: “Howell has long been associated with the Ku Klux Klanbecause of the rallies Michigan-based Grand Dragon Robert Miles held on a nearby farm in the 1970s and 1980s.”

And Reuters headlined a piece “Trump to campaign in Michigan town with historic links to white extremism.”

By the way, as a former young rabble rouser and Abby Hoffman fan from way back, I know my street theater, and this is exactly what I’d have done were I trying to punk a politician I opposed; and, the media being as gullible back then as it is now, it would have worked:

Around a dozen pallid young men dressed in black held a racist protest July 21 in front of the Livingston County Courthouse. The motley crew held signs that read “White Lives Matter” and shouted through megaphones, “We love Hitler, we love Trump.”

Uh huh.