SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
Oscar Brown, Jr. performing at Carnegie Hall in 2004. The soul singer was a civil rights activist whose song "The Snake" has been appropriated by President Donald Trump to spread anti-immigrant sentiment. (Photo: Hiroyuki Ito/Getty Images)
What Trump Doesn't Get, Say Songwriter's Daughters: He Is "The Snake" You Cannot Trust
"The elephant in the room is that Trump is the living embodiment of the snake that my father wrote about" in the song the president has appropriated to further his anti-immmigrant message
Feb 27, 2018
The early 1960s song "The Snake" is familiar by now to political observers who have seen President Donald Trump recite it at numerous campaign rallies and at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) last week--but the family of the man who wrote the piece says the president entirely misses the song's point.
Trump has presented the song's lyrics to his supporters as an allegory to the dangers of welcoming immigrants into the U.S., sharing the story of a woman who comes across a snake and is convinced to take care of him, only to be poisoned by the animal:
"I saved you," cried the woman."And you've bitten me, but why? You know your bite is poisonous and now I'm going to die." "Oh shut up, silly woman," said the reptile with a grin. "You knew damn well I was a snake before you took me in."
"The elephant in the room is that Trump is the living embodiment of the snake that my father wrote about in that song," Africa Brown, daughter of the songwriter Oscar Brown, Jr., told Don Lemon in a CNN interview on Monday night.
To be more accurate, Trump would need to change last line of the, she continued: "When he says, 'You knew damn well I was a snake before you took me in'--he could say, 'Before you voted me in.'"
Watch:
\u201c"The elephant of the room is that Trump is the living embodiment of the snake that my father wrote about in that song" - Africa Brown, daughter of Oscar Brown Jr., on the President using her father's song 'The Snake' to blast immigration https://t.co/H3dMeI4yBS\u201d— CNN Tonight (@CNN Tonight) 1519706095
Africa Brown and her sister, Maggie, expressed anger that Trump has "perversely" appropriated the song for his anti-immigrant agenda.
"My father's words are being used to support something that he would not back. He's attacking people of brown color and my father supported people all the time of all color," said Africa, whose father was a civil rights activist and one-time member of the Communist Party. Brown based the song on Aesop's fable "The Farmer and the Viper."
Trump has used the song to further "a political agenda that deals with separatism, racism, sexism, and it's the kind of thing that polar opposite to what Oscar Brown, Jr. was about," added Maggie. "And so to actually quote his words verbatim every time, pulling it out of his breast pocket as if it's this coveted thing that makes him a rock star and people of starting to request it because it's in popular demand when he does it. You know, that totally is insulting."
An Urgent Message From Our Co-Founder
Dear Common Dreams reader, The U.S. is on a fast track to authoritarianism like nothing I've ever seen. Meanwhile, corporate news outlets are utterly capitulating to Trump, twisting their coverage to avoid drawing his ire while lining up to stuff cash in his pockets. That's why I believe that Common Dreams is doing the best and most consequential reporting that we've ever done. Our small but mighty team is a progressive reporting powerhouse, covering the news every day that the corporate media never will. Our mission has always been simple: To inform. To inspire. And to ignite change for the common good. Now here's the key piece that I want all our readers to understand: None of this would be possible without your financial support. That's not just some fundraising cliche. It's the absolute and literal truth. We don't accept corporate advertising and never will. We don't have a paywall because we don't think people should be blocked from critical news based on their ability to pay. Everything we do is funded by the donations of readers like you. Will you donate now to help power the nonprofit, independent reporting of Common Dreams? Thank you for being a vital member of our community. Together, we can keep independent journalism alive when it’s needed most. - Craig Brown, Co-founder |
Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.
The early 1960s song "The Snake" is familiar by now to political observers who have seen President Donald Trump recite it at numerous campaign rallies and at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) last week--but the family of the man who wrote the piece says the president entirely misses the song's point.
Trump has presented the song's lyrics to his supporters as an allegory to the dangers of welcoming immigrants into the U.S., sharing the story of a woman who comes across a snake and is convinced to take care of him, only to be poisoned by the animal:
"I saved you," cried the woman."And you've bitten me, but why? You know your bite is poisonous and now I'm going to die." "Oh shut up, silly woman," said the reptile with a grin. "You knew damn well I was a snake before you took me in."
"The elephant in the room is that Trump is the living embodiment of the snake that my father wrote about in that song," Africa Brown, daughter of the songwriter Oscar Brown, Jr., told Don Lemon in a CNN interview on Monday night.
To be more accurate, Trump would need to change last line of the, she continued: "When he says, 'You knew damn well I was a snake before you took me in'--he could say, 'Before you voted me in.'"
Watch:
\u201c"The elephant of the room is that Trump is the living embodiment of the snake that my father wrote about in that song" - Africa Brown, daughter of Oscar Brown Jr., on the President using her father's song 'The Snake' to blast immigration https://t.co/H3dMeI4yBS\u201d— CNN Tonight (@CNN Tonight) 1519706095
Africa Brown and her sister, Maggie, expressed anger that Trump has "perversely" appropriated the song for his anti-immigrant agenda.
"My father's words are being used to support something that he would not back. He's attacking people of brown color and my father supported people all the time of all color," said Africa, whose father was a civil rights activist and one-time member of the Communist Party. Brown based the song on Aesop's fable "The Farmer and the Viper."
Trump has used the song to further "a political agenda that deals with separatism, racism, sexism, and it's the kind of thing that polar opposite to what Oscar Brown, Jr. was about," added Maggie. "And so to actually quote his words verbatim every time, pulling it out of his breast pocket as if it's this coveted thing that makes him a rock star and people of starting to request it because it's in popular demand when he does it. You know, that totally is insulting."
The early 1960s song "The Snake" is familiar by now to political observers who have seen President Donald Trump recite it at numerous campaign rallies and at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) last week--but the family of the man who wrote the piece says the president entirely misses the song's point.
Trump has presented the song's lyrics to his supporters as an allegory to the dangers of welcoming immigrants into the U.S., sharing the story of a woman who comes across a snake and is convinced to take care of him, only to be poisoned by the animal:
"I saved you," cried the woman."And you've bitten me, but why? You know your bite is poisonous and now I'm going to die." "Oh shut up, silly woman," said the reptile with a grin. "You knew damn well I was a snake before you took me in."
"The elephant in the room is that Trump is the living embodiment of the snake that my father wrote about in that song," Africa Brown, daughter of the songwriter Oscar Brown, Jr., told Don Lemon in a CNN interview on Monday night.
To be more accurate, Trump would need to change last line of the, she continued: "When he says, 'You knew damn well I was a snake before you took me in'--he could say, 'Before you voted me in.'"
Watch:
\u201c"The elephant of the room is that Trump is the living embodiment of the snake that my father wrote about in that song" - Africa Brown, daughter of Oscar Brown Jr., on the President using her father's song 'The Snake' to blast immigration https://t.co/H3dMeI4yBS\u201d— CNN Tonight (@CNN Tonight) 1519706095
Africa Brown and her sister, Maggie, expressed anger that Trump has "perversely" appropriated the song for his anti-immigrant agenda.
"My father's words are being used to support something that he would not back. He's attacking people of brown color and my father supported people all the time of all color," said Africa, whose father was a civil rights activist and one-time member of the Communist Party. Brown based the song on Aesop's fable "The Farmer and the Viper."
Trump has used the song to further "a political agenda that deals with separatism, racism, sexism, and it's the kind of thing that polar opposite to what Oscar Brown, Jr. was about," added Maggie. "And so to actually quote his words verbatim every time, pulling it out of his breast pocket as if it's this coveted thing that makes him a rock star and people of starting to request it because it's in popular demand when he does it. You know, that totally is insulting."
We've had enough. The 1% own and operate the corporate media. They are doing everything they can to defend the status quo, squash dissent and protect the wealthy and the powerful. The Common Dreams media model is different. We cover the news that matters to the 99%. Our mission? To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. How? Nonprofit. Independent. Reader-supported. Free to read. Free to republish. Free to share. With no advertising. No paywalls. No selling of your data. Thousands of small donations fund our newsroom and allow us to continue publishing. Can you chip in? We can't do it without you. Thank you.