Washington Times
By Seth McLaughlin
July 2, 2015
Ken
Crow, an Iowa tea party activist, says Donald Trump’s comments about
Mexicans may have been too blunt for some, but that is exactly why the
billionaire real estate
mogul and reality star is picking up, not losing, support in polls.
Mr.
Crow said people agree that the nation must confront the immigration
issue by first securing the border and then dealing with the millions of
people living in the
U.S. illegally.
“America
is looking for John Wayne, and Donald Trump is proving to be John
Wayne,” Mr. Crow said. “America is sick and tired of political
correctness, and they are sick
and tired of media bias destroying candidates.”
For
Mr. Crow and a growing number of others, Mr. Trump’s unvarnished candor
and the overwhelming media reaction against him are two big points in
his favor.
The controversy is putting stress on the entire Republican presidential field, which is struggling to find the right response.
Mr.
Crow predicted, “Quite a few of the candidates, I think, are going to
be forced into siding with him because they are watching his numbers
dramatically jump.”
With
the exception of Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, that has not been the case.
Most of the Republican candidates have either been silent or run in the
opposite direction.
Mr.
Trump ignited a controversy at his campaign launch three weeks ago when
he said Mexico is “sending people that have lots of problems, and
they’re bringing those problems
with us.”
“They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists,” he said. “And some, I assume, are good people.”
The
backlash began when Univision, the biggest Spanish-language broadcaster
in the United States, announced that it was cutting its ties with Mr.
Trump over the “insulting”
comments and no longer would air Miss USA and Miss Universe pageants,
which the tycoon co-owns.
NBC
and then Macy’s jumped onto the anti-Trump bandwagon. The retail giant
announced this week that it was yanking the Trump label of shirts and
ties from its shelves.
Mr.
Trump, 69, has stood his ground in typical fashion by saying his
statements were correct and accusing NBC and Macy’s of supporting
illegal immigration.
“All I’m doing is telling the truth,” Mr. Trump said on CNN.
Despite the backlash — and in some cases because of it — the brash real estate mogul’s political star has been on the rise.
A
CNN/ORC poll released this week showed that 12 percent of respondents
said they most likely would support Mr. Trump, placing him second behind
former Florida Gov. Jeb
Bush, who garnered 19 percent. Mr. Bush was one Republican candidate
who rejected Mr. Trump’s comments on illegal Mexican immigrants.
Mr. Trump also placed second to Mr. Bush in a CNN/WMUR poll out of New Hampshire.
A
Quinnipiac University poll, released the same day that Macy’s dumped
Mr. Trump, showed him tied for second in the Iowa caucuses with Ben
Carson.
“In
that second place gaggle is newly declared candidate and billionaire
businessman Donald Trump, whose early showing — he is getting one in 10
votes — worries many party
leaders. They see him as a potentially disruptive force,” said Peter A.
Brown, assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Poll.
The
episode has put the Republican Party in a tricky position given its
struggles to win over Hispanic voters in presidential elections and
concerns that overheated rhetoric
on immigration could cost the GOP at polls next year.
Divisions in the field
“I
do not agree with his remarks,” Mr. Bush said, in Spanish, during a
recent event in Nevada. “They do not represent the values of the
Republican Party, and they do not
represent my values. The man is wrong.”
New
Jersey Gov. Chris Christie called Mr. Trump’s remarks “inappropriate,”
and Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina told The Des Moines Register
editorial board this
week that it was wrong to cast a whole group of people in a negative
light.
“That is not going forward; that is going backward,” Mr. Graham said.
Former
New York Gov. George E. Pataki, a long shot to become president, has
called on the entire slate of Republican presidential candidates to
denounce Mr. Trump.
“I
don’t believe he will be the nominee of the Republican Party, but what
is troubling to me is the other candidates not standing up and
denouncing this type of horrible
speech,” Mr. Pataki said Wednesday on CNN. “It’s so derogatory towards
an entire class of Americans.”
Mr. Cruz, meanwhile, has been Mr. Trump’s biggest advocate in the Republican presidential field.
“I like Donald Trump. I think he’s terrific. I think he’s brash. I think he speaks the truth,” Mr. Cruz said this week.
Democrats, meanwhile, said Mr. Trump “fits right into the Republican field.”
“Frankly,
I wish Donald Trump’s utter disrespect for Mexicans and immigrants was
unique in the Republican presidential field,” said Holy Shulman,
spokeswoman for the Democratic
National Committee. “Sadly, it’s just an unvarnished look at their
anti-immigrant policies. You’d think the GOP would have learned by now.”
Frank
Sharry, executive director of America’s Voice, an immigrant rights
group, said he is shocked that more Republicans have not come out in a
more forceful manner against
the comments.
“It
is the combination of Trump’s bigoted remarks and the GOP’s leadership
failure to denounce them that is going to define the GOP with the
fastest group of voters in
America,” Mr. Sharry said. “The reaction among Latinos, especially
Latino immigrants, has been intense, and this is as much a cultural
moment as a political moment in which no self-respecting Latino and no
corporation that wants to do business with Latinos
can be seen as coddling Trump.
“This is an electoral game-changer, and I am stunned at the tepid response from the GOP leadership,” he said.
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