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More and more scholars are starting to see the work as a whitewashed version of Harlem’s vibrant Black music scene.

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For almost a century, few in the United States celebrated Cinco de Mayo. In the mid-20th century, sparked by the growing Chicano movement the David versus Goliath story fittingly mirrored the struggle for civil rights.

The lyrics have a far more complex origin than Trump’s use might imply. The poem originated in the 1960s from a soul singer and social activist in Chicago, Oscar Brown Jr. Its appropriation as a tool to drum up fear about immigrants has turned heads; some of Brown’s family are asking Trump to stop using it. And now, people are reading deeper into the president’s fixation with the parable.