Bishop Victor Couzens, Senior Pastor of the Inspirational Baptist Church – City of Destiny in Forest Park, OH., one of the members of the clergy invited to sit in the infamous meeting with Donald Trump, Monday, November 30, talks to Roland S. Martin on the Tom Joyner Morning Show, about the highly publicized meeting with that the billionaire real estate tycoon.
“If we’re talking about engaging a man that wants to be the President of the free world, you’ve got to give me strategy. He talked about his sentiments about jobs and wanting to bring them back to America. But I didn’t leave out of the meeting with anything I could stand on,” Cousins said.
Just minutes after the lengthy closed-door meeting with black pastors, billionaire presidential candidate Donald Trump describes the event as a huge success. There were more than 100 leaders of the black Christian community were in attendance, he said, and virtually no one asked him to change his often controversial tone regarding minorities and immigrants.
“I thought it was an amazing meeting,” he said, flanked by about a half dozen pastors who said they would endorse the Republican front-runner. “The beautiful thing [was] that they didn’t really ask me to change the tone. I think they really want to see victory, because ultimately it is about, we want to win and we want to win together.”
But not everyone who was in attendance at the closed-door gathering fully agreed with Trump’s characterization of the event. Namely, Bishop Victor Couzens, who disputed Trumps claims and told ThinkProgress that the meeting was smaller and more critical than the candidate described.
“That’s not true,” Couzens said when told about Trump’s assertion that he wasn’t asked to change his rhetoric. “We spent a lot of time just discussing the overall tone of the campaign. I personally said to him, he needs to apologize. He needs to repent.”
Couzens also noted the claim of over 100 leaders was a gross exaggeration. “There was only 40-50 people in the room max,” Couzens said challenging Trump to post the photo of the event, so people can see for themselves.
A few days ago, BW reported, that Northwest Baltimore’s Empowerment Temple Church pastor Rev. Jamal Bryant who declined to attend the meeting, said that, the group of Black Preachers who met with 2016 GOP Presidential front-runner, Donald Trump on Monday are worst than prostitutes.
You can hear the entire interview with Bishop Couzens and check out what he had to say about the meeting when he spoke with journalist and syndicated columnist, Roland S. Martin, in the media player below and leave your feedback in the comment section.
AJ Woodson
AJ Woodson is the Editor-In-Chief of Black Westchester and Co-Owner of Urban Soul Media Group, the parent company, Host & Producer of the People Before Politics Radio Show. AJ is a Father, Brother, An Author, Journalism Fellow (Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism), Hip-Hop Artist - one third of the legendary underground rap group JVC FORCE known for the single Strong Island, Radio Personality, Hip-Hop Historian, Documentarian, Activist, Criminal Justice Advocate and Freelance Journalist whose byline has appeared in several print publications and online sites including The Source, Vibe, the Village Voice, Upscale, Sonicnet.com, Launch.com, Rolling Out Newspaper, Daily Challenge Newspaper, Spiritual Minded Magazine, Word Up! Magazine, On The Go Magazine and several others.
