ANALYSIS: Trump’s racially charged slur offers a look at his true beliefs

Donald Trump once famously said that he has “the best words.”

Just days shy of the first anniversary of his inauguration, an eight-letter slur may be the word that comes to define his presidency.

That “shithole countries” remark is shocking, even coming from a man who says outlandish things.

The president’s reported suggestion that the U.S. should instead accept more immigrants from places like Norway (where the population is 83 per cent white) is even worse.

Cynics might think there’s nothing surprising about language like that coming from a man who called Mexicans “rapists,” or who proposed a Muslim ban, or who seems soft on white supremacists, but this time things are different.

Remember, Trump made the “shithole” comment in a private meeting. He had no reason to think the public would hear about him saying it.

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This wasn’t a play to a cheering crowd at a rally, or a message to his base watching cable news at home. There was no calculation or master strategy.

This was all Trump, spelling out his own deep-seated beliefs inside the Oval Office, as president of the United States. It’s clear he wanted those beliefs to shape U.S. immigration policy. Even the administration seems to understand that this is bad. Like, really bad.

For starters, Team Trump still can’t get their story straight.

The initial talking points from the White House actually defended the remarks without denying them.

Later, in a tweet, the president denied using those exact words, inviting a natural response from some of the senators who were in the room, who confirmed he had, in fact, said them.

Privately, Trump reportedly took a victory lap over all the fuss he’d caused, but publicly he’s now trying to clean up a mess of his own making.

“I’m not a racist. I’m the least racist person you will ever interview,” he shouted to reporters at his Mar-a-Lago resort on Sunday.

Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "I'm not a racist. I'm the least racist person you will ever interview," he shouted to reporters at his Mar-a-Lago resort on Sunday.

The problem is, that’s just not true.

Trump’s own history of racist actions and comments extends far back before he had a career in politics.

In 1973, Trump’s housing management company was the target of a justice department civil rights lawsuit over allegations he and his father avoided renting apartments to African-Americans while giving preferential treatment to whites.

In the late 1980s, Trump bought newspaper ads calling for the death penalty for four black men and one Latino man who were accused of rape – the so-called “Central Park Five.” The men were later exonerated by DNA evidence, but as recently as 2016, Trump was still insisting they were guilty.

And who could forget Trump’s years of promoting the idea that someone with a name like Barack Obama couldn’t possibly have been born in the United States, or be qualified to be president?

As president, Trump has shown he has no problem criticizing African-Americans for being unpatriotic, or ungrateful. He has shown little restraint when calling out crimes carried out by minorities, while turning a blind eye, or delaying his response to acts committed by whites.

The list goes on, and on, and on.

It’s actually an incredibly long list of racist comments and attitudes for the “least racist” person to have.

Yet somehow Trump’s comments have all too easily been dismissed by pundits and supporters as political – just a play to a certain base of voters, but somehow distinct from Trump’s actual views.

Remember when President Trump retweeted a bunch of anti-Muslim videos? The White House claimed he did it just to start a conversation about border security.

Trump’s first wife, Ivana, even appeared on British TV Monday to say that her ex is “definitely not racist.”

But what the world is now seeing is what minority communities across America have feared since the day Trump announced his candidacy.

The chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus, Rep. Cedric Richmond, told NBC about his belief that “Make America Great Again is really code for Make America White Again.”

Look no further than David Duke, the former Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan, who heaped praise on the president’s “shithole” comments.

Yet despite his history, his actions, and his most recent words, Trump still benefits from those willing to provide him political cover.

Speaker Paul Ryan tried to brush the president’s comments aside as “very unfortunate” and “unhelpful,” while going to great lengths to avoid being too harsh on the president.

Republican senators Tom Cotton and David Perdue, who were in the oval office when the “shithole” remarks were allegedly made, originally they claimed they could not remember what Trump had said. By Sunday, they were definitive that they “didn’t hear” Trump use those words.

They may try to obfuscate what happened during one Oval Office meeting, but there’s no hiding the role race has played in Trump’s life and actions.

This time around, what was allegedly spoken behind closed doors stings not just because of what was said, but because it’s so plausible that Trump said it.