In early June, I started talking about my old school district, my hometown, and why it is so essential to talk about structural racism in our curriculum & very white (93 percent) town. The suburbs Trump is talking about. Thread 1/n https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1288509568578777088

In the weeks since this conversation started, we got more support than pushback, but the pushback was intense. Most related to a conflation of economic segregation and racial segregation, both of which are alive and well in my hometown. 2/

Many folks believed our ask to talk about structural racism is unfounded, because if anything, our town is so white because of economics. There's no relation to race. And besides, why would people of color *want* to live in a town that is so white? 3/

Yes, Trump's original tweet mentions 'low-income housing'. But that is not what he means. The AFFH and Fair Housing Act were intended to correct explicitly racial bias and generations of explicitly racial disparities. Tying these rules to low-income housing alone is a lie 4/

Thinking about my hometown, there is a persistent narrative that its whiteness is an accident of chance, but nonetheless something to be protected. Conversations about race have just as quickly become about economics, and then about nothing at all 5/

And in that nothingness, what was once robust policy to undo purposeful, federally-mandated, structural & racist harm becomes about being nice to one another. Not saying the n-word to other students. Volunteering in "the inner city". 6/

Anyway, our petition got 6,000 signatures and we're still moving. There are ongoing community conversations and many who will not stop fighting for continued desegregation and accountability. In the meantime, mine and the few other families of color? 7/

Trump's actions since 2016 reinforce that suburbia was always meant to be white. That it becomes about low-income housing, or economic power, or anything else is just one outcome of segregating resources, property, and ownership and denying access to that wealth. 8/

@nickelly, @ReedKJordan, @justinsteil and I worked on a lot of research to that effect while at @MITdusp. You can see more about the good the AFFH produced while active at http://furtheringfairhousing.mit.edu  9/

We (and Larry Vale) also have a book coming out shortly on the results, reflections, and impact of the AFFH since it was written, repealed, and then altogether destroyed. On its way out the door any day now, and seemingly very timely. 10/

I know all the ways this was a golden season for my family. To have arrived to the US when we did, to have built our lives on the foundation of the now forgotten laws and legacy of Black visionaries that enabled my life to be what it ultimately was. 11/

That its end is now encapsulated in this absolutely disgusting tweet is all I ever needed to see today. It's not enough to say there's work to do. We all need to know this story exactly as vile and cruel and racist as it is. 12/12

For more on Rochester, its suburbs, and the educational, housing, and economic segregation still alive and well, @CitizenMurphy has written beautifully about this. We stan local media in this house and thank you for your work <3 https://www.democratandchronicle.com/in-depth/news/2020/02/05/rochester-ny-kept-black-residents-out-suburbs-decades/2750049001/