The head of the Republican National Committee, responding to demands from increasingly worried party leaders, spent nearly an hour Wednesday on the phone with Donald Trump, urging the presidential candidate to tone down his inflammatory comments about immigration that have infuriated a key election constituency.
The call from Chairman Reince Priebus, described by donors and consultants briefed on the conversation and confirmed by the RNC, underscores the extent to which Trump has gone from an embarrassment to a cause for serious alarm among top Republicans in Washington and nationwide.
But there is little they can do about the mogul and reality-television star, who draws sustenance from controversy and attention. And some fear that, with assistance from Democrats, Trump could become the face of the GOP.
Rather than backing down from his comments about illegal immigrants — whom he characterized as rapists and killers, among other things — Trump has amplified his remarks at every opportunity, including in a round of interviews Wednesday.
He insisted to NBC News that he has “nothing to apologize for” in his repeated remarks about Mexicans. But he also predicted that, if he secures the GOP nomination, “I’ll win the Latino vote.”
So the Dump Trump and Trump Trump crowd grows even larger. What an embarrassment. Trump is not only an embarrassment about immigration–he is an all-around embarrassment on pretty much all topics. He is an egotist and a blow-hard. He is, above all, un-presidential.
Meanwhile, the more interviews Trump gives, the more Republicans cringe. Unless Trump is contained, the Republicans are pretty much guaranteeing that they won’t retake the White House for decades, if ever. Isn’t there a way that political parties can filter out people who are simply unsuitable to run under their banner?
