… One result of Donald Trump’s so-far successful hijacking of the Republican nominating process has been to bring the ugly rhetoric and the closed-door policies back to the fore. When Trump labeled Mexican immigrants “criminals” and “rapists,” his GOP competitors not only failed to take him on, they mostly backed him up. …
Republicans are responding to something deeper than Trump’s words — they are acting on their primary voters’ views.
Seventy percent of Republicans told Fox News pollsters that they generally agreed with Trump’s comments about immigrants, while large majorities of independents and Democrats rejected Trump’s statements. CONT.
Mark Mellman (Mellman Group), The Hill