Trump’s Racist Post Was Harmful. His Policies Are, Too

President Donald Trump always provokes outrage on the regular occasions when he descends into overt public racism, as he did last week by reposting a video that portrayed Barack and Michelle Obama as apes.

But Trump’s bigger threat to race relations in America is coming through actions that attract much less attention — such as the federal investigation of Nike’s hiring practices revealed in court documents one day before he posted the video. Trump’s words matter, but it is primarily his deeds that threaten to unleash structural racial discord in the years ahead.