His leadership of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee’s organization of sit-ins at lunch counters across the South and participation as a Freedom Rider registering Blacks to vote made him a hero of the civil rights movement. From the time he began to learn from Martin Luther King, he was committed to one goal: acquiring civil liberties and voting rights for African Americans. John Lewis was singularly focused his whole adult life. Along the way, emulating his father, Trump absorbed racist ideas, entitled thinking, dishonest business practices and unbridled bravado. But Donald later became the favorite son, taking over the family business in 1971 and turning it into the Trump Organization. He sent Donald off to military school at age 13 when he misbehaved in school and later required his son to begin working for him at the lowest tier in the company. He has said, “My father was my inspiration.” Fred Trump was demanding. Trump learned some lessons from his hero too. Speaking of his mentor, Lewis testified, “He taught me to be hopeful, to be optimistic, to never get lost in despair, to never become bitter, and to never hate.” King became a mentor for Lewis, and it was from him that Lewis learned the principles and techniques of non-violent resistance. As he spoke of their impact, he said, “They inspired me to get in trouble.” The young man met his heroes while he was still a teenager - Rosa Parks when he was 17 and Martin Luther King two years later. Lewis first learned of Martin Luther King Jr., and Rosa Parks when he was just 15. “Both John Lewis and Donald Trump point to inspiring persons who helped shape their adult lives, but their role models were quite different.”īoth John Lewis and Donald Trump point to inspiring persons who helped shape their adult lives, but their role models were quite different. Although Donald Trump famously claimed that he only received a $1 million loan from his father, The New York Times asserts that he actually received more than $400 million. Subsequent investigations alleged that Trump’s father had found ways to avoid millions of dollars in taxes by passing money on to his children. By the 1970s, he was accused of discriminating against Blacks and Puerto Ricans, whom he refused to allow to rent his properties - a charge Donald Trump angrily denied in the press. In 1954, Fred Trump was called to testify before a Senate subcommittee to answer allegations that he had profiteered from the contracts. His family was privileged, having made their enormous fortune by constructing government-subsidized housing for middle-class families along the East Coast. Meanwhile, the future president was born as one of five children of New York real estate tycoons Fred and Mary Anne MacLeod Trump. He was reminded of that “place” when, as a teenager, Lewis attempted to get a library card at the Pike County Public Library in Troy and was told the library was for whites only and not for “coloreds.” Suffering many abuses and indignities in the Jim Crow era of the South in the 1940s and 1950s, his parents, grandparents and great-grandparents all cautioned him: “Don’t go getting’ in trouble” - by which they meant that he should be quiet and accept his place. His family was poor, living in a tiny three-room house with no plumbing or electricity. The future congressman was born as one of 10 children of Alabama sharecroppers Eddie and Willie Mae Carter Lewis.
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