Some Republicans Think the Republican Party Is Not the Party of Trump

I have heard a number of Republicans say on TV that they don’t think the Republican Party is the party of Trump. I think they are wrong. It doesn’t have to be, and I understand that they don’t like or follow him or think that he is good for the country. But a number of individual Republicans wanting to deny their party is becoming Trump’s doesn’t stop it from being true.
Recently on MSNBC I heard Susan Del Percio, Republican analyst, say that she ”[doesn’t] think of Donald Trump as Republican, so I don’t think he represents the party.” The problem is that the majority of Trump supporters are Republicans, and he is the Republican President. Admittedly, his support even among Republicans is slipping, but the last I heard around 80% of Republicans still support him. Yes, there are Republican commentators and gradually a few Republican politicians who have spoken out against him, but all but one of the Republican leadership have refused to speak out against Donald Trump by name for the things he has said or Tweeted. As long as the Republican leadership and the Republican voters are supporting and not calling out Trump on almost anything, the Republican Party is the Trump Party.
I don’t think it has to stay that way. Maybe people will wake up more and more as they wake up to the racism, current and historical, of Trump, along with other troubling issues about him. An outspoken supporter, pro-Trump blogger, and founder of a pro-Trump quarterly journal, Julius Krein, wrote that he regrets his vote for Trump in an August 17, 2017, op-ed in the New York Times. I recently saw him on “The Beat with Ari Melber” on MSNBC where he spoke about his op-ed and change of heart. But to save the Republican Party from Trump, the leadership and the voters need to reject Trump and all, or at least enough, of what he stands for – or the GOP is the party of Trump.
Trump, who says he doesn’t settle lawsuits, settled a suit under the Nixon administration for racist rental policies in Trump Organization properties; he took out a full page ad saying that the Central Park Five, who were exonerated for the rape and murder of a jogger, should be executed, and even said as recently as this past October (2016) that he still believes they are guilty; and he came to a lot of attention among his supporters for being one of the first and primary (and refusing to give it up until he absolutely had to) birthers. These are just a few examples of his racism and don’t touch on his comments in the wake of what happened in Charlottesville, VA, on August 12, 2017.
The Republican Party is the Party of Trump until further notice. I’m glad there are those Republicans who speak out against him and want to save their party from him, but until the voters and members of Congress, especially the leadership, reject him, they are not winning this fight.
Why it matters to me and should to you:
I don’t want white supremacists (the alt-right, neo-Nazis, etc.) to have control or be emboldened or legitimized by one of the two major political parties in this country. I see that as very bad for the country. Maybe Richard Painter, George W. Bush’s White House ethics lawyer, is right and the Republican Party will go the way of the long gone Whigs if it stays on the path of Trump. But much damage can be done first. White supremacist violence in this country waxes and wanes, but has never completely gone away. What will happen if the white supremacists think they have the support of the White House, and what they will do with that supposed support?
I hope there is no place in this county for their racism and hate. I don’t want that to be my country, and we need the Republicans to reject it (commentators, voters, and leaders). Until the voters and leaders and all Republican commentators do, we will have a growing problem with the white supremacist party of Trump. This is too important to forget and move on from, regardless of the next thing that comes along from the White House to distract us from it.