To the Editor:
The relief valve was activated with the announcement that Trump is not coming to our community.
With the vitriol in words and actions that his planned visit catalyzed, and certainly now with the mass murders in El Paso and in Dayton on top of the ones last week in Gilroy, Calif. — besides our country having become the murder-by-guns-capital of the world — any such visit would have been a concern to all of us in The Villages. But more problematic is Trump’s stoking the fires of racism with his bigoted and racist rhetoric and actions, and TV would not be immune. Safety and welfare definitely becomes an issue. But those that had anything to do with his invitation, presumably the Morse family and other close associates, let me say I would not want those of my friends, colleagues, even teammates in and on an athletic venue, that I respect for their decency, integrity, and character to be residents of what could become, not the friendliest hometown in Florida, but the friendliest racist retirement community in Florida.
Yes, this is a broad, perhaps unfair, characterization that certainly would not apply to all, but perceptions by those not knowing or having visited our hometown hearing that Trump was invited by those with the authority to make such decisions here could well stick with such an unwelcome moniker.
Given the unbelievable turmoil in our country, perhaps it is best that a Trump visit be put off indefinitely.
Miles Zaremski
Village of Dunedin
