Condemned – ‘racist’ Trump hit by historic Congress vote
A DIVIDED House of Representatives has voted to condemn US President Donald Trump’s racist remarks, when he told four congresswomen to “go back” to their ancestral countries.
The imagery of the 240-to187 vote was stark: a diverse Democratic caucus cast the president’s words as an affront to millions of Americans and descendants of immigrants, while Republicans – the majority of them white men – stood with Mr Trump against a resolution that rejected his “racist comments that have legitimised fear and hatred of new Americans and people of colour”.
Earlier Mr Trump insisted in a string of tweets he is not a racist – “I don’t have a Racist bone in my body!” he wrote – and the top two Republicans in Congress, Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky and House minority leader Kevin McCarthy of California, made identical statements when pressed on his remarks: “The president is not a racist.”
Mr Trump also lashed out at the four Democratic women – Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts and Rashida Tlaib of Michigan – for the third day in a row, accusing them of “spewing some of the most vile, hateful, and disgusting things ever said by a politician in the House or Senate”.
The Republican National Committee provided a list of comments to bolster Mr Trump’s contention, but in none did the four say they hate America or wanted to leave, as the president has asserted.
Despite a lobbying effort by Mr Trump and party leaders for a unified front, four Republicans voted to condemn his remarks: moderates Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania, Fred Upton of Michigan, Will Hurd of Texas and Susan Brooks of Indiana, who is retiring.
Also backing the measure was Michigan’s independent Republican Justin Amash, who left the party this month after becoming its sole member of Congress to back a Trump impeachment inquiry.
Democrats saved one of the day’s most passionate moments until near the end.
“I know racism when I see it,” said Representative John Lewis of Georgia, whose skull was fractured at the 1965 ‘Bloody Sunday’ civil rights march in Selma, Alabama. “At the highest level of government, there’s no room for racism.”
The spectacle of a president’s futile attempt to head off a House vote essentially proclaiming him to be a racist was extraordinary.
There have been only four congressional votes to approve resolutions aimed at censuring or condemning a president, according to a 2018 report by the Congressional Research Service.
The last occasion was against William Howard Taft in 1912, when he was accused of trying
‘I don’t have a Racist bone in my body!’ Trump tweeted
to influence a disputed Senate election.
Support for Mr Trump among Republicans rose as he sent out the racist tweets.
A survey showed his net approval rating with party voters climbed five points to 72pc, compared with the equivalent poll from last week.
The president has lost support with Democrats and independents in the Reuters/ Ipsos poll, however, since calling on the four politicians to “go back” to the countries “from which they came”.
Among independents, about three out of 10 said they approved of Mr Trump, down from four out of 10 a week ago. His net approval dropped two points among Democrats.
Mr Trump’s overall approval remained unchanged over the past week. According to the poll, 41pc of the American public said they approved of his performance in office, while 55pc disapproved.
A separate USA TODAY/ Ipsos Poll showed 57pc of Republicans said they agreed with Mr Trump’s “go home” tweets.
Overall, more than twothirds of Americans, 68pc, said they found the president’s tweets “offensive”.
Cliff Young, president of Ipsos Public Affairs, said “there’s a huge partisan difference in how we interpret what’s racist in this country”.
The public response to Mr Trump’s statements appeared to be a little better for him than in 2017, after the president said there were “very fine people” on both sides of a deadly white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia. His net approval dropped about 10 points in the week after the event.
Mr Trump is “doing exactly what Republicans want him to do”, Mr Hutchings added. “He’s taking on groups that they oppose.”