*Could it be that reality has struck Uncle Ben Carson? The Secretary of Housing and Urban Development is admitting that America’s black homeownership rates have fallen to the lowest levels on record under the Trump administration.
His admission came in an answer he gave to Fox News Host Maria Bartiromo after she asked him about a recent report that black homeownership is down, while Hispanic homeownership is up.
Interestingly, he pointed the finger at the George W. Bush administration, saying that during that era, black people had a lack of “wherewithal in terms of financial knowledge.”
“Interestingly enough, black homeownership has declined significantly, particularly because of the housing crisis,” said Carson, Trump’s lone black cabinet secretary, referring to the economic meltdown of 2007 and 2008.
“People took advantage of a lot of people who did not have a lot of wherewithal, in terms of financial knowledge about housing. And you know, by manipulating debt-to-income ratios and the various types of manipulations for credit that were done, they put people into houses that they couldn’t afford.” The nation, he said, is “still recovering” from that meltdown.
BET FOUNDER BOB JOHNSON PRAISES TRUMP, SAYS DEMOCRATS HAVE GONE ‘TOO FAR TO THE LEFT’ [VIDEO]
Uh oh. Somebody doesn’t have an answer and it puts Carson and the Trump administration in a curious position of having no answer as to why the problem is worse under Trump … especially since the administration is ALWAYS talking yang about black employment being at an all-time high. And just as interesting, he also was unable to explain why homeownership among Latinx people is rising.
“It is very important that we do what we can to get people back into housing, because the average net worth of a renter is $5,000, the average net worth of a homeowner is $200,000,” he observed, adding that this “accounts for a lot of the income gap that we are seeing, and we’re working very hard to correct that.”
The 1968 Fair Housing Act banned racial discrimination in housing decisions. The bottom line is that black homeownership rose for decades after the law’s passage, it has declined to pre-1968 levels in recent years and continues to get worse under Trump.
And since Carson’s boss has been been making a lot of racist statements lately, early in the interview, he defended Trump against charges of racism by noting the generally good economy as proof of his commitment to racial minorities.
“Look at the policies that have been done and look at the people who have been helped,” he urged. “You know, black unemployment at the lowest level ever.” As, apparently, is black homeownership.
