Early this morning, President Donald Trump shared a video of a white man in a golf cart with Trump campaign posters yelling “white power!” The video, shot at the Villages, a retirement community in Florida, showed an expletive-filled confrontation between a line of Trump supporters riding in golf carts and protesters calling them “racists” and “Nazis.”
Trump tweeted the video, below, along with the text: “Thank you to the great people of The Villages. The Radical Left Do Nothing Democrats will Fall in the Fall. Corrupt Joe is shot. See you soon!!!” He deleted his tweet three hours later.
Seniors from The Villages in Florida protesting against each other: pic.twitter.com/Q3GRJCTjEW
— Fifty Shades of Whey (@davenewworld_2) June 27, 2020
In a statement, White House deputy press secretary Judd Deere did not apologize for the tweet. “President Trump is a big fan of The Villages. He did not hear the one statement made on the video. What he did see was tremendous enthusiasm from his many supporters.” (The statement can be clearly heard at the beginning of the video.)
Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) called the president’s retweet “indefensible” on CNN.
Trump has long enjoyed support from the Villages. As my colleague Tim Murphy wrote back in 2016,
Since the first trailers popped up in cattle country an hour north of Orlando, Florida, four decades ago, the Villages has swelled to a population of more than 114,000 people; almost all are over the age of 55, white, and drive around the community in golf carts that can be outfitted to resemble taxis, fire trucks, or tanks.
Residents refer to the place as “Disney for adults.”
In addition to being one of the most quintessentially Florida places on Earth, the Villages is one of the most Republican places in Florida.
