Pulitzer-Prize winning historian says Trump now tied for 'most racist president in American history'

A Pulitzer-Prize winning historian and presidential biographer has said that Donald Trump is now tied for the most racist president to have ever held office.

Speaking on MSNBC on Monday, John Meacham said:

He has joined Andrew Johnson as the most racist president in American history.

He added:

Johnson, in a state message, said that African-Americans were incapable of self-government and relapsed into barbarism if they weren’t closely supervised.

On Sunday, Trump tweeted that four Democratic congresswomen of colour should 'go back' to the countries they came from. Three of them were born in the United States, and one of them, Ilhan Omar, was born in Somalia, before coming to the United States as a refugee in the Nineties.

MORE: Ilhan Omar has been a US citizen longer than Melania Trump

Meacham also said that America was never founded on the idea of birthright, but more so on the belief that "all men are created equal", which is stated in the Declaration of Independence.

Finishing his statement, he said:

We didn’t apply it that fully then, we haven’t applied it fully now. But that journey toward a more perfect union is the story of the country.

Meacham has written several works on American leaders and in 2009 won the Pulitzer Prize for his biography of Andrew Jackson, American Lion. He was also selected to be the official biographer of George H. Bush and was asked to give eulogies for both President Bush and Barbara Bush when they died in 2018. He has been a loud critic of Donald Trump throughout his presidency, writing for the New York Times in 2018, Meacham compared Trump to Rev. Charles Coughlin, a catholic priest and radio host who has been accused of antisemitism.

More: Trump says that his tweets aren't racist because 'many people' agree with him

More: Hillary Clinton fires back at Trump's 'racist' tweet, and it's perfect