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Clark Atlanta University leaders have pushed back on Donald Trump’s claims that he “saved” the historically Black institution when he spoke at a rally at Georgia State University on Saturday.
During the rally, the Republican presidential nominee invited up Michaelah Montgomery, a Clark Atlanta alumna and conservative activist. Trump recounted to the crowd how he first met her in a restaurant earlier this year, and he said she thanked him for the federal COVID-19 relief funds that went to historically Black colleges and universities during the pandemic.
“She looks at me, says, ‘It’s President Trump. You saved my college.’ And I said, ‘How the hell do you know that?’ … This one is so smart, so sharp,” Trump said at the rally.
Clark Atlanta swiftly issued a response on social media countering the narrative that the university needed saving.
“As amongst our nation’s 4,000 Higher Education institutions, multi-national corporations, hospitals and others to have benefited from CARES and HEERF bipartisan support garnered during the administration of Former President Trump, Clark Atlanta University is appreciative of such support, but was not ‘saved’ by COVID funding,” the university’s statement read.
The post goes on to add that Clark Atlanta, like all HBCUs, “remains dedicated to our mission of student success and continued support at all levels of our Democracy.”
Trump has repeatedly touted his support for HBCUs. Just last week, Trump told the National Association of Black Journalists that HBCUs were “out of money” and that he had “saved them” when “nobody else was doing it.”
