Hastings’ comment about Trump creates uproar

Conservatives erupted with outrage this week over Congressman Alcee Hastings revving up a Democratic Party audience with a joke about President Donald Trump drowning.

Others laughed. Some rolled their eyes.

The joke in question was about the “difference between a crisis and a catastrophe.”

A crisis, Hastings said, is if Trump falls into the Potomac River and can’t swim. A catastrophe is if “anybody saves his ass.”

Many in the audience clapped and laughed.

The joke, first reported on Sunday by the South Florida Sun Sentinel, generated an explosion of interest. Google Trends shows interest in Hastings shot up as word got out about the joke.

Conservative websites, including Breitbart, The Washington Times, The Blaze weighed in. “Hastings has been a venomous and divisive critic of prominent Republicans going back years,” Breitbart said. The subject generated coverage by the Washington Post, The Hill, Roll Call and Fox News.

Newsweek asked the question “Who is Alcee Hastings?”

Answer: South Florida’s longest-serving member of Congress, Hastings was first elected to represent Broward and Palm Beach counties in 1992. Hastings, 81, was a pioneering civil rights lawyer for decades before he became a federal judge, a job he lost

Hastings