As the Republican Civil War rages on, former Senators and Representatives are stepping up as proxies for the party faithful to try and rescue shreds of the Republican brand.
This morning, former Republican Senator John Danforth wrote an op-ed for the Washington Post disowning Trump as a Republican.
"The fundamental reason Trump isn’t a Republican is far bigger than words or policies," Danforth wrote. "He stands in opposition to the founding principle of our party — that of a united country."
"We are the party of Abraham Lincoln, and our founding principle is our commitment to holding the nation together," he continued.
He then went on MSNBC to expand on this with Chris Jansing.
"I am a Republican. I've always been a Republican," he insisted.
He continued, "I'm loyal to my party. but Donald Trump is not."
"He is not just different on a few issues, he's fundamentally opposite of what the Republican party is, the way it was founded. It's the party of Abraham Lincoln."
Concluding, he explained that Trump is "a divider and uses every opportunity he gets to set one group against the rest of the country. to say to people they don't really belong."
"He's the opposite of what the Republican party is, and he's the opposite of what a founding principle of the country has been, and that is to hold together all these diverse groups and interests in one country."
I am not at all certain what Republican party Sen. Danforth is referring to, but it is certainly NOT the Republican Party of the last four decades. From the moment Richard Nixon chose to use the Southern Strategy and appeal to the "silent majority" to get elected, to Donald Trump's obvious white supremacist beliefs, Republicans have certainly not stood for unity in this country.
As a Senator who served during the Clinton years and observed Newt Gingrich laying the foundation for where we are today, Danforth is either Pollyanna or deluded. You choose.
