The party of Lincoln and Trump
Republicans everywhere are in a tizzy.
Party leaders are showing increasing dismay at the prospects of a Donald Trump nomination.
It’s their own fault.
When Trump failed to give a full-throated repudiation of the support he’s getting from ex-Ku Klux Klansman, and virulent racist, David Duke, he exposed the Republican’s persistent Achilles heel.
Many African-Americans and Hispanics believe that Trump’s run for the presidency has been fueled by supporters who feel as David Duke does that, “Voting against Donald Trump at this point is really treason to your (white) heritage.”
Republicans know they haven’t been able to gain support of non-white Americans for decades, but they’ve not had white supremacists so closely attached to one of their leading candidates for president – until now.
Sure, Trump claims he “disavows” David Duke, and his support for him.
But he’s also played dumb about knowing who David Duke is.
He appeared on CNN last week, and he claimed, “I don’t know anything about David Duke, OK?”
He’d just given his opponents fresh fodder to launch direct attacks against Trump and his mostly-white support.
“The fight is to save the Republican Party; the party of Lincoln and Reagan from someone who is not just a con artist, but who refuses to criticize the KKK,” said Marco Rubio.
True, the Republican Party might be the party of “Lincoln and Reagan,” but Rubio should know it’s also the party of Nixon, Joe McCarthy and, er, Donald Trump!
It is a political party that’s only been along for the ride, while Trump has hijacked any notion of its hopes for “minority outreach.”
While Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders have made overt plays (and sometimes pandered) for the support of black voters, Trump has shown no signs of needing them.
So he might claim he’d like any racists to leave his campaign support by the front door, but he doesn’t seem to be that worried if they’d return through the backdoor.
And besides, New Jersey Gov. Christ Christie has, curiously, joined forces with Trump.
He’s now acting as the master-of-ceremonies at his rallies and victory speeches.
Christie, I might add, had called the president of the United States a “petulant child” during a debate in January.
I suspect Christie was unaware that many African- Americans who heard the words “petulant child,” felt as if he’d really wanted to call President Obama a “boy.”
I’m not calling Trump or Christie racists.
So far, though, there’s no denying the fact that there were more black Oscar winners this year, than there are black audience members at Trump’s rallies.
Trump doesn’t seem to mind.
But there are a few leaders of the Republican Party who aren’t pleased with Trump’s “dog-whistle” rhetoric, that’s drawn support from people who have a history of being antagonistic toward people of color.
“Let me make it perfectly clear: Senate Republicans condemn David Duke, the KKK and its racism,” says Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.
Yep! That’s the same Mitch McConnell, who on the night of President Obama’s inauguration in 2009, promised his fellow Republicans that he had one job – to work diligently to ensure Obama would become a “one-term president.”
McConnell failed.
But he hasn’t stopped trying to make Obama’s life miserable.
He’s recently publicly refused to even consider the president’s pick to fill that vacant seat on the Supreme Court.
As for Trump, and his apparent reluctance to appreciate the dangerous political environment that he’s fostering, he can no longer play coy.
He knew when he hounded President Obama with that birth certificate nonsense, he was sending a strong signal to those people who wanted to delegitimize him; to make him appear to be unfit to serve in the office in which he’d been duly elected to serve.
A Public Policy Poling poll last September revealed that 61 percent of Trump’s support comes from people who don’t think Obama was born in the United States. And that 66 percent them still think he’s a Muslim.
Trump needs those supporters.
He needs them more than mainstream Republicans need him.
Edward A. Owens is a three-time Emmy Award winner and 20-year veteran of television news. E-mail him at freedoms@bellatlantic.net
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