House Republican campaign chair says there's no place for 'send her back' language
Source: Politico
By STEVEN SHEPARD 07/18/2019 09:58 AM EDT
The chairman of House Republicans’ campaign arm on Thursday criticized the “send her back” chant that animated the crowd at Donald Trump’s Wednesday night rally and added a new dimension to the president’s attacks on four Democratic freshman women.
“I didn’t watch the rally last night, but there’s no place for that kind of talk,” said Rep. Tom Emmer (R-Minn.), who chairs the National Republican Congressional Committee and hails from the same state as the Democrat who was primarily targeted, Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.). “I don’t agree with it.”
Emmer, speaking at a breakfast with journalists hosted by the Christian Science Monitor, was pressed later whether the chant was racist. He declined to address that question, instead saying it was “not acceptable.”
Emmer also stopped short of directly criticizing Trump for his comments about Omar and three other Democratic lawmakers, all of whom are women of color, calling the controversy “manufactured.”
Read more: https://www.politico.com/story/2019/07/18/tom-emmer-send-her-back-trump-rally-1419210
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........ Emmer, who took over the NRCC in the days after Republicans lost their eight-year House majority, signaled that the committee would seek to tie Democratic members in swing districts — even those with moderate voting records — with the four women and other Democrats who represent what he called “a new Red Army of socialists.”
On one hand, Emmer became the latest Washington Republican to express discomfort with the behavior of the party’s base voters in the Trump era. But he also made no apologies for his committee’s combative tone in characterizing Democrats as far-left socialists.
“Our mission this cycle is to take back the majority, and I think we have a clear message on how to do that,” he said.
