We don’t want white people to apologize, JD Vance. We want them to be honest about it. | Opinion

While Donald Trump’s administration may be economically horrible for non-billionaires, one thing it excels at is distractive identity politics. Whether weaponizing gender or race, this administration has routinely used identity division to take the focus off its failure to address inflation, unemployment, healthcare, or economic issues for regular people.

The latest example: In a speech last month at the conservative AmFest 2025, Vice President JD Vance said “In the United States of America, you don’t have to apologize for being white anymore.” While many people I know scoffed at this, the one thing this administration is transparent on is tapping into saying the quiet part out loud.

When many white people began being told the actual history of this country, it was the equivalent of telling young children that Santa Claus is not real. Some accepted the reality. Some grieved quietly. Others threw tantrums and put their fingers in their ears, calling it a lie. The shrewdest formed groups like Moms For Liberty and organized politically to push for Social Studies to be reduced to cheerleading propaganda, as if white children were not strong enough to learn our full history without becoming puddles of shame.

But here’s the thing. No one has ever wanted people to apologize for being white. Most of us simply want folks to stop lying about our nation’s history. We want financial literacy to not just pretend that the wealth gap is simply about spending and saving habits without also acknowledging the gaps in wealth tied to inheritance gaps. We want acknowledgment of land that was granted or given to European immigrants by the government via the Homestead Act, which they’ve now rewritten as bootstrap theory.

We want acknowledgment that in 1860 cotton represented 60% of the US economy, 40% of Mecklenburg County’s population was enslaved people, and nearly 1/3 (30.8%) of families in confederate states owned enslaved people, with each slave’s value ranging from $40,000-$75,000 per slave in current dollars. We want acknowledgment that for generations Black people were forbidden from owning property, redlined out of wealth, and that many of our grandparents fought for this nation while not being able to benefit from the GI Bill like their fellow white soldiers.

We want folks to realize that there have been reparations for Native American genocide, the Holocaust, Japanese Internment, and even for some slaveowners after the Civil War with reparations only being treated as “radical” for Black folks. At minimum, we’d like folks to stop the gaslighting.

Shame, which Vance references, leads to avoidance, attacking myself, attacking others, and/or withdrawing, none of which are healthy. But it’s how we’ve handled history in our nation.

Some folks push to avoid our history out of discomfort. A select subset says it makes them ashamed to be white. Others attack those who acknowledge our true history as “divisive,” or “race baiters.” Some say they don’t see color, even though any kid with a crayon box learns to see colors. The issue isn’t seeing color. It’s accepting there has been disparate treatment and opportunity based on discrepancies in melanin.

Instead of consuming Vance’s shame, embrace compassionate accountability: “I can’t undo what’s already been done, but can commit to reconciliation, doing the next right thing,” understanding racial and class progress/regression in America are long intertwined. Or continue embracing the elite’s original con and try managing your mortgage, farm and/or medical bills by “owning the libs.”

Justin Perry is a contributing columnist in Charlotte. He can be reached at JustinPerry.observer@gmail.com.

This story was originally published January 2, 2026 at 6:00 AM.