Donald Trump received rare blowback from Republican lawmakers over a video posted to social media that included a racist image of former President Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle Obama, depicted as primates.
Since Trump’s return to the White House, Republican lawmakers have treaded carefully when disagreeing with the president, often communicating their concerns in private for fear of suffering his wrath.
But the swift calls to remove the post, which also echoed false conspiracy theories about the 2020 election, represented a rare moment of bipartisan backlash to Trump’s actions from lawmakers on Capitol Hill.
Republicans never operate in good faith.
There is a method used here on repeat that inevitably shifts the Overton Window.
It goes like this: Trump does the racist thing, Republicans do theater around clutching their pearls. The racism is “retracted.”
However, is it? It’s still out there in the public consciousness. Now it’s normalized. Now when it happens again it’s not as shocking.
Having your cake and eating it, too.
Republicans in the periphery say they stood up to the president
Republicans at the center get to say their president is Based
Add in the national media censoring reproducing of the racist quote in mainstream press, while echoing it in talk radio. A very effective inside/outside strategy that deludes normals as it stooks up the reactionaries.
The more common response is the republicans say they haven’t seen the offending video.
“I don’t know I can’t comment on something I haven’t seen. But the president connects to the people on his social media…”
He does the same thing when he is asked about one of his allies. They will be like Mr. President what about that Nazi that said all that Nazi shit, and he will feign ignorance.
I’m certainly not shocked that Trump posted some racist shit