A mural dedicated to the memory of George Floyd collapsed Tuesday night in Toledo, Ohio. According to local reports, the building it was painted on was struck by lightning.
Floyd was killed in May 2020, when a police officer kneeled on his neck for over nine minutes. That officer, Derek Chauvin, was recently convicted of murder and sentenced to over 20 years in prison.
Floyd’s death prompted months of unrest, as Americans protested racial injustice. His face became one of the symbols of the movement, with murals popping up in cities across America.
While many might consider a lightning strike an unfortunate coincidence, Donald Trump Jr. had a very different, immediate response to seeing the news.
“It’s almost like a higher power is telling us something,” he wrote on Twitter. “When was the last time you heard of a brick building being destroyed by lightning? I am a builder and I’m not sure I’ve ever heard of it.”
There’s plenty wrong with the former president’s son’s tweet. The building didn’t collapse, it wasn’t destroyed. From pictures, it appears that part of the facade the mural was on crumbled, which would make sense if there was a lightning bolt that hit it.
But that’s more of a minor quibble. The better question to ask is what sort of message would a “higher power” be trying to send?
Thankfully, Trump Jr. pivoted to another platform to answer the rhetorical question posed by his own tweet, sharing the news story on his grid as well.
Apologies, his caption is very long, but Trump Jr. flags Floyd’s previous arrests as reasons that God might be mad that people rallied around him.
“This will drive some people nuts but oh well. I mean you have to wonder if someone, like a higher power, is telling us something here?!? Obviously what happened to George Floyd should never happen anywhere!!! That said, objectively speaking, given his history I’m not sure turning him into a deity and a role model for our children is exactly the right idea either. Also please don’t tell me they’re not trying to turn him into a role model/hero there’s statues of him going up all over the country etc. etc. The same lunatics who want to erase our founding fathers want statues of this man all over the place. Again, we can learn from a disastrous situation but the pendulum seems to always correct way too far these days. Discuss!!!”
Well, is God so mad about the movement that swelled up around Floyd’s death that he only struck one of the thousands of murals across the country—hoping the nation would take notice of a storm in Toledo, Ohio—while also allowing the person who antagonized, vilified, and fought the movement its entire way to be voted out of the White House?
Discuss!!!