Go with me on this one.
You have a friend who recently became the subject of global condemnation for his anti-Semitic rants that cost him millions in endorsement deals and made him a social pariah. He calls and asks if you will have him over for dinner.
You say, “Is 7 good for you?”
Your guest arrives with three other guys you’ve never met and were not expecting.
This was not a “what if.” The host in this scenario was the 76-year-old former president of the United States who had just announced his latest bid for the biggest brass ring in the land. His friend, Ye, formerly known as Kanye West, brought along Nick Fuentes, a 24-year-old White supremacist and Holocaust denier.
Ye claims the former president was “very impressed” with Fuentes, who slathered Mr. Trump with praise, his favorite dish. Ye also claims he offered the 45th president of the United States the opportunity to be the 50th Vice President should he, Ye, win the 2024 Presidential election.
For a guy who hates Jews, that’s real chutzpah! And insane.
Donald Trump says he had no idea who Nick Fuentes was or anything about his White nationalist beliefs. For the sake of argument, let’s say that’s true. He still knew who Kanye West is and his anti-Semitic beliefs.
Donald Trump claims he invited Kanye to “help him out” after Ye lost all his endorsement deals for tweeting, “I’m going Death-Con 3 on the Jews.” Trump also made a point of reminding the world Ye is “Black.”
The former President’s alibi is only part of what’s hard to swallow about the “Dinner Party Heard ‘Round the World.”
The Trump-Kayne-Fuentes dinner is instructive beyond the sheer awfulness of it. The dirty secret of our two-party system is, both left and right knowingly keep their lunatic fringes within arm’s reach.
The left has its own racists, bigots and anti-Semites, and are okay with them as long as they keep it behind closed doors. Nury Martinez, Kevin DeLeon and Gil Cedillo are exhibit A.
After George Floyd was murdered by cops, many Democrats embraced the idiotic “defund the police” movement. With crime spiking everywhere, now they’re scrambling to walk it back.
Trump doesn’t care about firewalls. His GOP is OK with pretty much any belief as long as it’s anti-liberal. It was not a slip of the tongue when Donald Trump said, “There were good people on both sides” after the 2017 Confederate “Unite the Right” rally in Virginia killed one and injured 19 others. He has repeatedly defended the January 6th rioters and promised pardons for all if elected once again.
Trump’s dinner with Kanye and Fuentes was not an accident. It was designed to send a message to anti-Semites, “You have a seat at my table.” Literally. And it’s always a bonus for Donald Trump when an African American supports him, offering a measure of immunity when his own racially inflammatory rhetoric causes him trouble.
So-called regular Republicans scrambled to express their outrage: Mike Pence, Kevin McCarthy, Mitch McConnell, Chris Christie … the list goes on. Hypocrites all. The GOP has long-known who Donald Trump is. They had no problem with him as long as he was winning. Their moral compass only kicked in after Trump’s poor showing in the midterms.
There are still those who defend the former president. Now, more than a week later. Ye has doubled down, appearing on the loathsome Alex Jones Show, and declaring, “I like Hitler.”
How does this end?
That’s something for all of us to chew on.
Doug McIntyre’s column appears Sundays. He can be reached at: Doug@DougMcIntyre.com.