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US President Donald Trump was booed by fans at Madison Square Garden on Monday after he sealed off midtown Manhattan so that he, family members and members of his administration could attend Game 3 of the NBA Finals. To deal with this rejection from the home audience, Trump resorted to one of his favorite methods of self-soothing: calling a black person stupid.
After sportscaster Stephen A. Smith said before Monday night’s game that he would blame Trump’s presence if the New York Knicks lost – which they did – Trump responded that Smith was “a nice guy” but “to run for president you need a certain aptitude – you need a high IQ – I’m not sure he has that. I actually don’t think he has it.”
Trump also falsely claimed that the boos at the Garden when he appeared on screen during the pregame national anthem were “mostly cheers.”
Smith counters Trump’s attack
Smith – who has considered running for president – criticized Trump for forcing himself and a series of strict security measures on the NBA Finals. The Secret Service set up a security ring around the arena, fans had to wait in line for hours to pass enhanced screening, and public viewings had to be moved from their usual seats near the arena.
“It’s about a person who exhibits a level of narcissism that really gets the hell out of me,” Smith said Monday. “He has no business here tonight. This has nothing to do with politics. It has everything to do with the energy surrounding the New York Knicks – and he’s disrupting everything the Knicks were in tune with at the time.”
“I’d say the same thing if it was Obama, George W., Clinton – I don’t give a fuck if we go back to Reagan,” Smith added. “If it causes the Knicks to lose tonight, I blame him. I blame the President of the United States.”
A familiar pattern
Responding to the president’s doubts about his intelligence, Smith said Tuesday that if the president “wants to talk about IQ, I could say I can put my IQ against his.”
“I could do something even better. I could ask you why you’ve been avoiding me for the past year since I asked you to talk to me. I could ask you to debate me if you think you’re being such a tough guy. We could go about it in many ways,” he added. Smith also addressed the loss of revenue for bars around the arena: “I thought you were pro-business? I thought you wanted to help New Yorkers because you love New York?”
Trump’s response to Smith’s comments was not the first time he has attacked a prominent person of color in American media or politics by questioning their intelligence. Earlier this year, he called Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson — the first Black woman to hold the position — the “new low-IQ person” on the court.
Systematic degradation
The president has also used the term “low IQ” to describe several lawmakers of color, including Reps. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.), Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) and Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas).
During the 2024 campaign, Trump regularly referred to Vice President Kamala Harris as a “low IQ individual” and called her “slow” at least once. He has also directed the insult at Black journalists and other people of color around him, including New York Attorney General Letitia James.
Although Trump has also used the insult against white politicians such as former President Joe Biden and California Governor Gavin Newsom, it most often affects people of color. According to an analysis of Trump’s Truth Social posts by Mother Jones, the president used the phrase “low IQ” at least 50 times between 2022 and April of this year. Sixty percent of the cases were directed against black or brown people – and that was only in writing.
Silver welcomes Trump to the arena
On Monday, NBA Commissioner Adam Silver told “Inside the NBA” that Trump was “welcome” to the Garden. “What makes sport so special, especially when so much divides people, is that it is something we have in common,” he said. “We should look for those commonalities.”
But the person first to try to label anyone who criticizes him as stupid – even when it comes to the NBA Finals – is the president himself.