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From [HERE] and [HERE] Potential New York Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump touted his relationship with a number of prominent African Americans Thursday, saying it may help him defeat President Obama in the 2012 presidential election.

In a radio interview yesterday with New York Post political columnist Fred Dicker, Donald Trump said, “I have a great relationship with the blacks. I’ve always had a very great relationship with the blacks.”

Walter Fields, who is the former head of the NAACP in New Jersey and is currently executive editor of NorthStar News, said the following about Trump’s comments:

“I think it's not only inappropriate, it's highly offensive,” he said. “He's actually treating African-Americans as objects: ‘the’ blacks. “It indicates two things,” Fields said. “It indicates a level of ignorance." This "level of ignorance" is evidence that Trump has a mindset "reminiscent of the Jim Crow era." It wasn't that long ago that "the objectification of blacks was paramount to maintain slavery." He does not see us as people. Or, to him, we're objects that he believes in his mind for some reason are enthralled with a Trump candidacy.

“It’s ironic that we're beginning to mark the 150th anniversary of the Civil War, when the objectification of blacks was paramount to maintaining slavery.

“It’s just weird that Donald Trump is expressing a point of view in which we’re a collection of things, and that we should be impressed by Donald Trump. In the circles I travel in, he doesn’t even merit a mention.”

“His expressions are an indication of a man who's completely detached from reality. I haven't run across a single African-American who's supportive of a Donald Trump candidacy. He's going to understand that ‘the blacks,’ as he calls us, are too smart to see this as a serious appeal."