(CNN) On Monday, LeBron James sat down for an interview with CNN's Don Lemon to promote a new public school that his charitable foundation -- along with the Akron school system -- helped build. In the interview. James and Lemon talked about race, President Donald Trump and the state of the country.

It's worth checking out the entire interview -- it's only 15 minutes long -- but one line from James in it really jumped out at me. Asked by Lemon whether life was harder as an African-American living during Trump's presidency, LeBron responded: "No, I think it's always been there, but I think the President in charge now has given people -- they don't care now. They throw it in your face now."

That's an important insight from James -- and something that the debate that rages over whether Trump is actually racist or not misses. In some ways, it doesn't matter whether Trump is actually a racist. What matters is how his actions both provide cover for those who hold bigoted views and also serve as a sort of encouragement for these sorts of noxious views to be aired publicly.

Do I know that Trump's "both sides" reaction in the wake of the white supremacist violence in Charlottesville, Virginia, was born out of some sort of inchoate racism? No, I don't. But what I do know is that equating peaceful protesters with white supremacists emboldens those who hold bigoted views. It affords them some semblance of credibility; the President said the counterprotesters were just as responsible as we are for this violence!

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