It was striking how violent Republican candidates were at Wednesday's debate.
DeSantis gets applause after he promises to shoot dead people bringing drugs across the border pic.twitter.com/FOyxlMXm2J
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) November 9, 2023
On topic of Israel-Hamas war, Haley says that she urged Netanyahu to "finish them" pic.twitter.com/j75QhlNiCl
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) November 9, 2023
Vivek Ramaswamy proposes building a wall along the border with Canada.
"So we gotta just skate to where the puck is going, not just where the puck is. Don’t just build the wall, build both walls!" pic.twitter.com/cwrdcWu406— Justin Baragona (@justinbaragona) November 9, 2023
However, as I mentioned on this week's Professional Left Podcast, those same Republicans never mentioned the guys who were convicted of trying to kidnap the governor of Michigan.
Pollster Cornell Belcher on The Reid Out noticed that, too.
CORNELL BELCHER: The whole predicate of Donald Trump's presidency is that hate, and what I saw on display there is crossing the line. It is not about being tough. It is about hate, camouflage that's being tough, and it's hate against, surprise, surprise, a bunch of brown people. So I'm not surprised by that at all.
JOY REID: And by the way, not only just hate against brown people because you're right. Iran becomes a surrogate for Muslims. You know, we're going to shoot people in Mexico becomes a surrogate for brown people south of our border. To have three nonwhite people on that stage who are in some ways the most vehement and most vicious about the violence that they would do as president was interesting. And of course, Ron Desantis who has already done violence to desperate Venezuelan migrants from collecting them from Texas and shipping them to wherever his paid airline flights would take them. It feels like maybe that's what they're zeroing in on. They have decided the republican party hates people of color maybe and they think if they show they share in it, maybe that will help them.
BELCHER: Well, there is something, I think, there, about sharing the values. It is how can I prove I’m not like one of them? It’s like, I’m going to double down and be as angry and as hateful towards them as possible so I do think it is something sort of how can I get more credibility with the base around these conversations, having to deal with hate and taking on what they, again, claim. You don’t see this same sort of vitriol about terrorism when it comes to American terrorism. You know the last decade, you know, the people who have been the biggest terrorists in America is coming from white supremacy. You never hear any of them talking about I’m going to wipe out white supremacy in this country. You never hear them say we’re going to take out, we’re going to smoke white supremacy out of this country. In the same way they talk about terrorism in other places. I wonder why that is.
