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Tea Party Speaker At Anti-Immigrant Rally: "You Cannot Breed Secretariat to a Donkey and Expect to Win the Kentucky Derby"

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In case you missed it, there’s a video you need to watch, first captured by The Nation’s George Zornick earlier this week. It’s created quite a buzz online already with over 45,000 views.

On Monday, we wrote about the Tanton Network’s BALA Rally, an ugly attempt to sow division between immigrants and native-born Americans using some of the most inflammatory messengers available.  We posted about some of the ugliness and xenophobia that was seen at the rally.  Some comments from Tea Party Community co-founder Ken Crow, however, really take the cake:

Yesterday, Huffington Post posted the video in an article titled, That Awkward Moment When The Tea Party Rally Gets Overtly Racist. And, today, the Center for Immigration Studies has (for some reason) posted the full video of Crow’s speech. Keep in mind that Senators Ted Cruz (R-TX), Senator Jefferson Beauregard Sessions (R-AL) and Congressman Steve King (R-IA) also spoke at this rally.

As you can see, Crow spends time talking about breeding and how you can’t breed thoroughbreds with donkeys.  It’s unclear what his exactly his analogy is intended to refer to, but presumably it’s about immigrants, which makes it incredibly ugly.

Here are the highlights of what he told the crowd:

I’m from Texas, and one of the things about being from a ranch in Texas is that you learn about breeding.  You learn about breeding livestock, you learn about breeding horses.  And believe it or not I’m here to talk to you about your breeding.

You are American patriots.  You came from those incredible blood lines of Thomas Jefferson and George Washington and John Smith. And all these great Americans, Martin Luther King. These great Americans who built this country. You came from them. And the unique thing about being from that part of the world, when you learn about breeding, you learn that you cannot breed Secretariat to a donkey and expect to win the Kentucky Derby. You guys have incredible DNA and don’t forget it.

[Pointing to Arlington National Cemetary] You’ve got the breeding, you’ve got the DNA, you’ve got the patriotism and you’ve got the sacrifice. And I’ll be damned if I’m going to give my country up to a bunch of people who do not deserve to be here.

We’re used to this kind of ugliness from the anti-immigrant crowd, including several Republicans in Congress. What’s clear is that the rest of the country is starting to tune into the hateful rhetoric. John Boehner might want to keep that in mind as he drags out the process for reform. This is what will define his party.