It’s clear that Donald Trump is espousing an overtly racist vision of America.
He says a U.S.-born judge of Mexican ancestry cannot sit in judgment of Trump because, well, he’s of Mexican ancestry. He doubts a Muslim judge could be fair. He started his rise in the GOP as a “birther” — claiming the President was not born in America. He calls Mexican immigrants “rapists” and “criminals.”
And that’s before we consider his campaign promises: round up 11 million immigrants; ban all Muslims from admission into the U.S.; revoke birthright citizenship to 4.5 million “anchor babies;” rescind protections for 700,000 Dreamers on his first day as President; round up Syrian refugees already resettled; etc.
According to Lynn Tramonte, Director of Ohio’s Voice: “Republicans like Senator Rob Portman have a choice to make: support an authoritarian demagogue who promises to divide the country along racial and religious lines and trample on America’s democratic values; or take a true stand and revoke your support for Trump. It’s not enough to say that you disagree with the candidate on certain issues, if you’re still planning to vote for him for President.
“Senator Portman has tried to have it both ways, but he can’t. The situation is actually quite simple: stand with Trump and you stand for racism. Stand with Trump and you are putting your party over your country. Stand with Trump and be forever defined by your capitulation.”
Tramonte continued: “There’s no room for semantics and word games – whether you have officially endorsed Trump, announced you are voting for Trump, or are simply supporting ‘the eventual Republican nominee’–who you know will be Trump–you are helping to elect Donald Trump to our nation’s highest office. You own his platform and his agenda. And no, it’s not enough to ‘disagree’ with Trump’s comments about Judge Curiel. What does it say about your priorities, your principles, and your moral convictions that you can recognize that Trump’s racism is unacceptable, yet are working to elect this man to the presidency?”
As prominent conservative Erick Erickson wrote of Trump’s comments on Judge Curiel: “These were not racially tinged or racially charged attacks. This was racism plain and simple … The attacks are racist. To claim that someone is unable to objectively and professional perform his job because of his race is racism. And damn the GOP for its unwillingness to speak up on this … the Party of Lincoln intends to circle the wagons around a racist. Damn them for that.”
“This election is a battle for the soul of our country. We either stand up to racism, or we encourage and normalize it. We either speak up for tolerance and equal opportunity, or we undermine both. We either stand for the American proposition of E Pluribus Unum – Out of Many, One – or we divide America by race and religion. The choice couldn’t be clearer, and so far Senator Portman has chosen wrong,” Tramonte concluded.
