Donald Trump’s most self-defeating move (opinion)

Editor’s Note: Sign up to get our new weekly column as a newsletter. And President Donald Trump is failing on every front.” In memory of George Floyd Kerem Yucel/AFP/Getty Images Police officer Derek Chauvin kept his knee on George Floyd’s neck for 8 minutes and 46 seconds. “They allowed us to breathe for a moment and get to know George Floyd, the man, as he was in life – instead of knowing him only by the horrifying circumstances of his death, another unarmed black person dead after an encounter with police.” Dr. Erica Farrand, a pulmonologist and critical care physician in the Bay Area, wrote that she has wrestled with racism and discovered that, “in an effort to work harder and be better, to fit the mold and gain a platform, I had unconsciously stopped bringing my whole self to work.” “Three days after George Floyd’s plea ‘I can’t breathe’ was met with apathy and violence,” Farrand added, “I stood at the bedside of another black man. Significant progress has been made over the last two decades in a number of departments all across the country, but much, much more work remains.” Speaking out Mike Stone/Getty Images North America/Getty Images On Tuesday, former President George W. Bush wrote that he and his wife Laura “are anguished by the brutal suffocation of George Floyd and disturbed by the injustice and fear that suffocate our country.” The tragedy, he wrote, “raises a long overdue question: How do we end systemic racism in our society?” That was the moment that law professor Dorothy Brown said she became convinced that 2020 would be the year serious police reform would become possible. And I wish he would have sat in the front row for a church service aimed at praying for peace, calm and unity.” Still, he wrote, “When the President says he wants both justice for Mr. Floyd and a restoration of law and order, I believe him.” For more on issues relating to the George Floyd protests: Peniel Joseph: What black children will learn from George Floyd’s death John Kasich and Nina Turner: We know policing can be made more just, because we did it Theodore W. Small, Jr.: What my Florida town can teach us about racist policing Rebecca MacKinnon: Trump is making America more like China Gautham Rao: A ‘Hamilton’-esque scandal helped give Trump his cudgel Bakari Sellers: How we can start systemically reforming the police.