US President Donald Trump came under fire from Democrats and even some members of his own Republican Party on Monday after launching an extraordinary xenophobic attack on four progressive Democratic congresswomen.<\/p>\n
\u201cAll they do is complain,\u201d Trump told reporters at a White House event featuring products \u201cMade in America.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThese are people that hate our country,\u201d he said of the four Democratic lawmakers. \u201cIf you\u2019re not happy here, you can leave.\u201d<\/p>\n
Trump also accused the four first-term Democratic congresswomen \u2014 who are of Hispanic, Arab, Somali and African-American origin \u2014 of having \u201clove\u201d for US \u201cenemies like Al-Qaeda.\u201d<\/p>\n
Asked by a reporter whether he was concerned that many people saw his comments as racist, Trump said: \u201cIt doesn\u2019t concern me because many people agree with me.\u201d<\/p>\n
Several hours after his remarks, the four \u2014 Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, who is of Puerto Rico origin, Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, who is of Somali origin, Rashida Tlaib of Michigan, the first Palestinian-American woman elected to Congress, and Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts, who is African-American \u2014 hit back at a news conference.<\/p>\n
Pressley condemned Trump\u2019s \u201cxenophobic and bigoted\u201d comments and said \u201cwe will not be silenced.\u201d<\/p>\n
Omar said Trump made a \u201cblatantly racist attack\u201d on four lawmakers \u201cof color.\u201d \u201cThis is the agenda of white nationalists,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Omar and Tlaib repeated calls for Trump to be impeached.<\/p>\n
\u2013 \u2018Destructive\u2019 \u2013<\/p>\n
The president first attacked the lawmakers with a series of tweets on Sunday, saying they should \u201cgo back\u201d to their countries of origin if they didn\u2019t like the United States.<\/p>\n
His comments prompted outrage from Democrats \u2014 and, initially, silence from Republicans.<\/p>\n
On Monday, several of his party faithful began to speak up.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy view is that what was said and what was tweeted was destructive, was demeaning, was disunifying, and frankly it was very wrong,\u201d said Senator Mitt Romney, a Republican from Utah.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is no excuse for the president\u2019s spiteful comments \u2014 they were absolutely unacceptable and this needs to stop,\u201d said Senator Lisa Murkowski, a Republican from Alaska. \u201cWe must demand a higher standard of decorum and decency.\u201d<\/p>\n
Republican Senator Susan Collins of Maine said she disagreed with the policies espoused by the \u201cfar-left\u201d Democratic lawmakers but Trump was \u201cway over the line.\u201d<\/p>\n
For Republican Senator Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, \u201cthe citizenship of all four is as valid as mine.\u201d \u201cThey are entitled to their opinions, however misguided they may be,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Texan Will Hurd, the only black Republican in the House of Representatives, told CNN that Trump\u2019s behavior was \u201cunbecoming of the leader of the free world.\u201d<\/p>\n
And Senator Tim Scott, a black Republican from South Carolina, criticized the president for using \u201cunacceptable personal attacks and racially offensive language.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2013 \u2018Cold, hard strategy\u2019 \u2013<\/p>\n
Trump\u2019s comments appear to be aimed at galvanizing his mostly white electoral base ahead of the 2020 presidential vote \u2014 while also stoking racial tensions and divisions among his political opponents.<\/p>\n
\u201cWith his deliberate, racist outburst, @realDonaldTrump wants to raise the profile of his targets, drive Dems to defend them and make them emblematic of the entire party,\u201d said David Axelrod, who served as chief strategist for Barack Obama\u2019s two White House campaigns.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a cold, hard strategy,\u201d Axelrod said on Twitter. \u201cFasten your seatbelts, it will only get worse as the election approaches.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe voters will decide,\u201d Trump told reporters.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf (the Democrats) want to gear their wagons around these four people, I think they\u2019re going to have a very tough election, because I don\u2019t think the people of the United States will stand for it.\u201d<\/p>\n
In his initial Twitter attack on Sunday, Trump \u2014 who before becoming president pushed the racist \u201cbirther\u201d conspiracy theory that Obama was not born on US soil \u2014 said the congresswomen came from corrupt, poorly managed countries to which they should return.<\/p>\n
Ocasio-Cortez, Tlaib and Pressley were all born in the United States while Omar arrived from war-torn Somalia when she was a child.<\/p>\n
Former vice president Joe Biden, who is seeking the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination, denounced Trump as the most \u201copenly racist and divisive\u201d president in US history.<\/p>\n
\u201cGo home to your country? It\u2019s sickening, it\u2019s embarrassing,\u201d Biden said.<\/p>\n
Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic speaker of the House of Representatives, has had a tenuous relationship with the four left-leaning congresswomen but she jumped to their defense.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen @realDonaldTrump tells four American Congresswomen to go back to their countries, he reaffirms his plan to \u2018Make America Great Again\u2019 has always been about making America white again,\u201d Pelosi said.<\/p>\n
Pelosi said she was seeking Republicans to co-sponsor a House resolution \u201ccondemning the president\u2019s xenophobic tweets\u201d and \u201ccharacterization of immigrants.\u201d<\/p>\n
Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer of New York said he planned to do the same in the Senate.
\nimage_prin t BSS\/AFP<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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