Brittany Horn

The News Journal

Black Delawareans, especially those living in urban areas, say tension between police and the community have reached a new level following the election of Donald Trump.

The president-elect, who garnered the support of police officers throughout the country during his campaign, has said he plans to return "law and order" to America through the increased use of tactics like "stop-and-frisk," long pegged as a racial profiling measure for minorities in urban areas. In August, he listed poverty, poor education and joblessness as reasons for black voters to support him.

“Look at how much African-American communities have suffered under Democratic control," Trump said at the rally in Dimondale, Michigan. "To those I say the following: what do you have to lose by trying something new like Trump? What do you have to lose?"

African-Americans in Delaware say the United States has, for a long time, not provided them with fair and consistent law and order, and many see Trump's presidency as a turn for the worse.

"Traditional politics suggest that you say things all the way to the left or all the way to right but when you come to the general elections, you become more centrist," said the Rev. Donald Morton, head of Complexities of Color Coalition in Wilmington. "Donald Trump has shown us that that's the old way of politics. The militarization of police, the idea that he would be the law and order president, we've heard that before. And we have no indications that he will deviate from that rhetoric."

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This election, said Ty Johnson, who founded Churches Take a Corner in the city, brought that lack of discourse and understanding from both police and the community to the forefront.

"There was a certain code of hidden racism ... that was going across this country," he said. "But I didn't know that so many white folks felt displaced, that they could not relate to folks of color who have been disproportionately locked up all their lives ... and that this was the way they had to teach the lesson."

The National Fraternal Order of Police backed Trump in his run for the presidency, citing his continued support of law enforcement and emergency responders. Locally, the Delaware State Lodge supported Trump, but said his beliefs on law enforcement policies won't necessarily change policing in the First State.

"It's still going to be business as usual," said state FOP President Fred Calhoun. "I think it's because we're such a small state and we train so much. ... We don't have the issues we have in larger states."

He specifically referenced Thomas Webster, the Dover police officer who was caught on video kicking a suspect in the head, and Dover's response to the incident in 2015. Unlike other cities across the country, Calhoun said, there wasn't an uprising following release of the video.

"There wasn't a big uproar," he said. "That's because the citizens of Dover knew what the police department is about. ... They know the average police officer is there to help them."

He believes America will benefit from hearing a difference in "the rhetoric that President Obama and The White House is spewing to create an uprising," Calhoun said.

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Keith James, a 21-year-old Wilmington activist, wants to take aim at the local level. In his mind, Generation X has been lost in the shuffle and handed decisions they do not support or condone.

He also said that too often, national tragedies overshadow local progress. For him, Trump has taken America back in time.

"America has already been run like a business," he said of Trump's presidential plans. "We stole the land. We stole the labor. And we capitalized upon it. Slavery is illegal but not in the form of punishment. If we increase stop and frisk, we're going to increase black people in America being incarcerated. It's taken slavery to a whole new level."

Others hope that Trump's election will serve as a wake-up call and a rallying cry for the African-American community.

Mahkeib Booker, who founded Black Lives Matter Wilmington, said Wednesday that all this election did was show the type of America we're living in – an America that doesn't value the rights of women, minorities or the disabled.

"I just want the African-American community to band together," Booker said. "There are lot of disappointed Americans today, but it's like Obama said. Don't boo, vote. Don't sit around and cry about it. Do something."

Contact Brittany Horn at (302) 324-2771 or bhorn@delawareonline.com. Follow her on Twitter at @brittanyhorn.