Republicans Want to Stop Talking about White Supremacists So They Can Cut Taxes for Rich People
Reporter, ThinkProgress
The White House has had a tumultuous few weeks.
As CNN noted on Friday, in the last four weeks alone, President Trump has fired chief strategist Steve Bannon, fired Chief of Staff Reince Priebus, hired and fired communications director Anthony Scaramucci, publicly shamed his own attorney general and Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, banned transgender troops via twitter, made up two phone calls, thanked Russian President Vladimir Putin for expelling American diplomats from the country, threatened nuclear war with North Korea, and defended attendees of a white supremacy rally.
And that’s not even half of it.
This was quite a segment from @CNN that will be shared far and wide pic.twitter.com/AK7dznQku5
— David Rutz (@DavidRutz) August 18, 2017
“Clearly, he had a tough week. There’s no way around that,” Cortes said.
Although Cortes didn’t explicitly mention Charlottesville, it was clear that Trump’s defense of white supremacists, KKK members, and neo-Nazis who attended a rally in Charlottesville last weekend was what made last week “a tough week.”
Trump’s defense of those who attended the United the Right rally defined what was purportedly a week dedicated to infrastructure.
It took Trump until Monday, two days after a woman was killed by a man who drove a car into peaceful counter-protesters, to even mention white supremacists, Klansmen, and neo-Nazis. He buoyed the movement Tuesday when he defended attendees of the Unite the Right rally, saying there were “very fine people” on all sides.
“All presidents have tough weeks,” Cortes said Sunday. “I believe that will become background noise once we get taxes done, and once this economy starts growing the way it’s capable of.”
Cortes was asked about a new poll showing Trump’s job approval numbers have dropped to 34 percent, and although Cortes said he doesn’t buy the poll numbers, he’s sure they will rebound.
“The economy’s already accelerating. There’s a lot of optimism out there in the country,” Cortes said. “If we can throw tax cuts into the mix, I think this economy can absolutely take off, and then I think we’d see those poll numbers rebound very, very quickly for the president.”
Rep. Dennis Ross (R-FL) made similar comments last week, telling Bloomberg that Trump’s comments about white supremacists were “frustrating” because he wanted to start focusing on tax reform.
“[It’s] very frustrating for those of us who want to start focusing on the issues ahead—tax reform, infrastructure, the debt ceiling,” Ross said. “I wished we would start focusing on those issues, and we need to start healing and bringing people together—instead of peeling back the scabs.”
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Reposted from ThinkProgress
