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The Divider in Chief
Americans think political rhetoric has gotten too heated – but it’s hard to change when it’s coming from the president.
By Joseph P. Williams | Staff Writer
July 7, 2017, at 6:00 a.m.
When Rep. Steve Scalise, a Louisiana Republican, was shot by an angry gunman at an Alexandria baseball field in June, shaken politicians on Capitol Hill said the perpetrator, James Hodgkinson, had an invisible accomplice – the nation's hyperbolic, polarized political discourse.
Suggesting that liberal demonization of conservatives inspired Hodgkinson's bloody quest, both House Speaker Paul Ryan, a Republican, and Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, the House's top Democrat, vowed to keep the gloves on during the next partisan fight. A poll released June 26 seems to validate that pledge: A majority of Americans on the right and left believe the rhetoric in the nation's capitol has worsened since the 2016 presidential election. But President Donald Trump stomped on Washington's moment of zen.
Less than 24 hours after Capitol Police killed Hodgkinson in a shootout, and as Scalise lay hospitalized in critical condition, Trump scratched his itchy Twitter fingers with a bitter message about Hillary Clinton and the ongoing investigation of Russian meddling in the 2016 election, the latest in a string of attacks on his political adversaries.
Weeks later, both Republicans and Democrats said Trump crossed a line when, responding to her on-air criticism of him, Trump tweeted that TV host Mika Brzezinski had shown up at one of his swank Mar-a-Lago parties, bleeding from a botched facelift.
Yet even as the Marist/NPR poll on public attitudes, released June 26, revealed that seven out of 10 Americans say the level of civility in Washington has gotten worse since Trump came to Washington, the president capped off a weekend of slapping around the Washington news media with one last Monday morning swipe on Twitter.
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https://www.usnews.com/news/the-report/articles/2017-07-07/trumps-divisive-rhetoric-is-at-odds-with-congress-unity-pledges
