Reuters Report Reveals Every Living U.S. President, EXCEPT ONE, is a Descendant of Slaveholders

Reuters researched the genealogies of America’s living presidents, members of Congress, governors, and Supreme Court justices to determine which political figures were the descendants of slaveholders.

In its report, Reuters found that every living U.S. president, except one, is a descendant of slaveholders.

Donald Trump is the exception.

“President Joe Biden and every living former U.S. president – except Donald Trump – are direct descendants of slaveholders: Jimmy Carter, George W. Bush, Bill Clinton and – through his white mother’s side – Barack Obama,” Reuters stated.

“Trump’s ancestors came to America after slavery was abolished.”

REUTERS INVESTIGATION REVEALS: Every living President is a descendent of slaveholders – except Donald Trump

Yes, even Obama.

Jimmy Carter, George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, and Joe Biden were all found to have slaveholding ancestors.https://t.co/3WWAPL4JDB

— Charlie Kirk (@charliekirk11) June 27, 2023

Reuters:

"Every living former U.S. president EXCEPT Donald Trump are direct descendants of slaveholders." pic.twitter.com/Z8eNuOZss6

— Citizen Free Press (@CitizenFreePres) June 27, 2023

The report also stated that at least 100 of the 536 members of Congress have ancestors who were slaveholders.

The list includes Democrats and Republicans.

“Among 536 members of the last sitting Congress, Reuters determined at least 100 descend from slaveholders,” the report states.

“Of that group, more than a quarter of the Senate – 28 members – can trace their families to at least one slaveholder,” it adds.

“They include some of the most influential politicians in America: Republican senators Mitch McConnell, Lindsey Graham, Tom Cotton and James Lankford, and Democrats Elizabeth Warren, Tammy Duckworth, Jeanne Shaheen and Maggie Hassan,” the report noted.

The report also said two of the current U.S. Supreme Court justices had ancestors who were slaveholders.

“Two of the nine sitting U.S. Supreme Court justices – Amy Coney Barrett and Neil Gorsuch – also have direct ancestors who enslaved people,” the report states.

In addition, the report found that 11 out of 50 governors in the United States had ancestors who were slaveholders.

In the first effort of its kind, @Reuters studied thousands of documents and worked with genealogists to trace US leaders’ lineages, finding 118 who descend from slaveholders. Historians say the findings offer a new way to discuss America’s fraught past https://t.co/zVchZpgLig pic.twitter.com/ZYWEIv6PJM

— Reuters (@Reuters) June 27, 2023

Reuters noted:

The White House had no comment on the efforts by the activist groups or on Biden’s ancestral ties to slavery. The president’s great-great-great-grandfather enslaved a 14-year-old boy in 1850, census records show.

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Politico provided further details into Joe Biden’s ancestry in 2021:

But in the wake of Biden’s election last fall, Alexander Bannerman, a genealogist in West Virginia, went to work on the first complete, authoritative genealogy of the 46th president to be produced for publication.

Along with Gary Boyd Roberts, an expert in presidential lineages, Bannerman co-authored an article on Biden’s ancestry for the Winter 2021 issue of American Ancestors. The magazine is a publication of the New England Historic Genealogical Society, a widely cited authority in the field of ancestry.

Bannerman told me that on his father’s side, some of Biden’s ancestors enslaved people.

He pointed to Biden’s great-great-great-grandfather, Jesse Robinett, who enslaved two people in Allegany County, Maryland, in the 1800 census. Another 3rd-great-grandfather, Thomas Randle, enslaved a 14-year-old male in the 1st District of Baltimore County, Maryland, in 1850, he said, citing census records and slave schedules, which were separate headcounts of slaves conducted alongside the census in 1850 and 1860.

In 1860, census records show that Randle and his family had moved to Baltimore County’s 13th District, Bannerman said, and an 1860 slave schedule for the 13th District again shows Randle enslaving a single man. (The spelling of Randle varies in some records, as is common for that period, and the spelling of Robinette, which is Biden’s middle name, has changed over time).

A White House spokesperson, Mike Gwin, did not respond to requests for comment.

According to a 2016 Reuters article, Donald Trump’s grandfather, Friedrich Trump, left Germany for the United States in 1885.

German archivists have found a letter written by U.S. President-elect Donald Trump’s grandfather, asking to be allowed to return to his German homeland after his wife failed to settle in to life in the United States.

The letter, signed by Friedrich Trump, who left Germany at the age of 16 in 1885, was unearthed at the state archives in the western German region of Rhineland-Palatinate.

After the turn of the century, Friedrich Trump returned from the United States to Germany, where he met and married his wife, Elisabeth, with whom he returned to New York.

“She lasted for around two years before making it known that she wanted to return to Germany,” Franz Maier of the Rhineland-Palatinate state archives in Speyer told Reuters Television.

Friedrich had, however, failed to deregister properly before he left Germany and was not therefore allowed to be renaturalised in Bavaria, which was then its own kingdom.

An accompanying document in the archived dossier read: “the settlement in Bavaria cannot be permitted”.

You can read the full Reuters report HERE.