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CNN Reporter Calls Trump Poland Address a 'White America, America First' Speech

July 9, 2017

CNN White House correspondent Jeff Zeleny described President Donald Trump's address in Poland last week as a "White America, America First kind of speech" during a panel discussion Sunday morning.

Trump's speech in Warsaw last Thursday focused on themes of the collective inheritance and protection of Western civilization. This, Zeleny said, was not the kind of speech Trump could have delivered in the U.S., although he said it was one of his best speeches in terms of staying on a focused theme.

"This is not a speech he could have given really any place else. This is a white America, America first kind of speech," Zeleny said. "It wasn't a modern-day speech, if you will. It was sort of a throwback speech."

He said it was one telling people to "be afraid" of what is happening in the world.

"It was praised in a lot of corners, but he probably couldn't have given that speech here in America," he added.

Zeleny is not the first to suggest Trump's Poland speech was tied up in questionable racial politics. A Vox article said the speech sounded like an "alt-right manifesto," and the Washington Post's Jonathan Capehart claimed it was full of "white-nationalist dog whistles."

"'We write symphonies.' What on Earth does that have to do with anything?... In that one line, taken in context with everything else Trump said, what I heard was the loudest of dog whistles," Capehart wrote.

Others praised Trump's speech as a coherent explanation of his values.

Published under: CNN , Donald Trump