The Atlantic - The Republican Party’s White Strategy

[TomCADem]

Much of the media coverage portrays Trump as being extreme on matters of race and immigration among Republicans. However, many so-called "mainstream" Republicans such as Pete Wilson and Mitt Romney have ridden racial resentment among whites to positions of prominence in the Republican party. The fact of the matter is that there are a whole lot of racists out there, and it is too great of a temptation for many Republicans to campaign on a xenophobic message.

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2016/07/the-white-strategy/485612/

When it comes to latinos, Donald Trump has a muse: Ann Coulter. Last June, when Trump called Mexican immigrants “rapists” in his presidential-campaign announcement, the comment took many journalists by surprise. But that’s because many journalists hadn’t read Coulter’s work. Her book Adios, America: The Left’s Plan to Turn Our Country Into a Third World Hellhole, which hit bookstores two weeks before Trump entered the race, is packed with statements about “Latin American rape culture” and “the gusto for gang rape, incest and child rape of our main immigrant groups.” On page 191 Coulter writes, “The rape of little girls isn’t even considered a crime in Latino culture.” On page 173 she warns, “Another few years of our current immigration policies, and we’ll all have to move to Canada to escape the rapes.” Before announcing his presidential run, Trump called Adios, America a “great read.” Since Trump began his campaign, Coulter has occasionally warmed up crowds at his rallies.

* * *
Although trump has broken with his party’s establishment on many issues, immigration has been the most central to his rise. His “rapists” comment dominated media coverage of his campaign launch, and his pledge to build a wall along the Mexican border is, by far, his best-known policy proposal. When his events grow “a little boring,” the real-estate mogul told The New York Times’ editorial board, “I just say, ‘We will build the wall!’ and they go nuts.” According to a Pew Research Center poll this spring, the wall divides pro-Trump from anti-Trump Republicans more sharply than any other issue.

But Trump is not the first Republican to put illegal immigration at the heart of his presidential bid. Pete Wilson did it 20 years ago. On a late-summer day in 1995, with the Statue of Liberty as his backdrop, the then-governor of California declared that he was entering the presidential race because “there’s a right way to come to America and a wrong way. Illegal immigration is not the American way. We teach our children to respect the law, but nearly 4 million illegal immigrants in our country break it every day, and Washington—Washington actually rewards these lawbreakers by forcing states to give them benefits paid for by the taxpayers. That’s like giving free room service to someone who breaks into a hotel.”

The reference to free room service was a nod to Proposition 187, a California ballot initiative Wilson had successfully championed the year before, which denied undocumented immigrants public education, nonemergency health care, and other government services. It was the beginning of a ferocious reaction to Latino immigration in the Golden State. In 1995, Elton Gallegly, a Republican congressman from California and the chair of a House task force on immigration reform, recommended an amendment to the U.S. Constitution to deny automatic citizenship to the children of undocumented immigrants. In 1996, California voters passed Proposition 209, which prohibited public universities and other state institutions from giving preference to racial and ethnic minorities. In 1998, Californians passed Proposition 227, which curtailed bilingual education.

[uponit7771]

1. +1, this was tRumps stated straTegery all along... find the missing angry white male and they can't

... right now tRump is even with white women and Obama lost them by 12%.

Not looking good for him right now but he still has time to call all non whites dangerous.

[auntpurl]

2. Not enough white dudes. The Romney problem.

As a side note, I think Ann Coulter might be even more of a disgusting human being than Trump.

[FSogol]

3. Is Coulter a possible Trumpy VP candidate?

[auntpurl]

4. Oh GOD

that is a horrible prospect. I don't want Coulter to have 5 more seconds of airtime than absolutely necessary. Awful person.

[FSogol]

6. Agreed. Maybe Trump can convince the ebola virus to be his running mate?

[auntpurl]

7. I vote for ebola over Coulter

I vote for a ham sandwich with a D next to its name over Trump, however. I'm not picky.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

5. We can lose this thing but I like our hand so much better!!!