Quote of the Day: “We Polled the Race Stuff”

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Greg Sargent ponders Donald Trump’s reluctance to denounce white nationalism today, and concludes that (a) Trump doesn’t want to risk his support among racists, (b) he doesn’t recognize that he has any particular public obligations as president, and (c) he can’t stand to give in to critics who are pressuring him. Plus this:

Joshua Green’s new book on Trump strategist Stephen K. Bannon reports that in August 2016, as Hillary Clinton elevated the issue of white nationalism to national prominence with a major speech, the Trump campaign internally decided not to go too far in renouncing it. Bannon told Green: “We polled the race stuff and it didn’t matter.”

Now that’s a moral compass for you. They polled “the race stuff” and then decided they had no special need to oppose racism. So they didn’t. A real profile in courage, our president.

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Mother Jones was founded to do journalism differently. We stand for justice and democracy. We reject false equivalence. We go after stories others don’t. We’re a nonprofit newsroom, because the kind of truth-telling investigations we do doesn’t happen under corporate ownership.

And the essential ingredient that makes all this possible? Readers like you.

It’s reader support that enables Mother Jones to devote the time and resources to report the facts that are too difficult, expensive, or inconvenient for other news outlets to uncover. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

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