House Republican Calls Trump Tweets ‘Racist and Xenophobic’

Texas Rep. Will Hurd was the first of three Congressional Republicans to denounce President Donald Trump’s Sunday Twitter tirade as racist on Monday.

“I think those comments are racist and xenophobic, and they’re also inaccurate. The four women he’s referring to are actually citizens of the United States. Three of the four were born here,” Hurd told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour.

“It’s also behavior that is unbecoming of the leader of the free world. You should be talking about things that unite us, not divide us,” Hurd added.

Other Republicans who have condemned Trump’s comments are Sen. Pat Toomey, Rep. Pete Olsen.

Politically, the comments also don’t help, said Hurd. “While you had a civil war going on within the Democratic Party, between the far left and the rest of the party now they have circled the wagons and are starting to protect each other.”

Amanpour pressed Hurd further. “Do you think the president is racist?” she asked.

“The comments were indeed racist,” said Hurd.

Hurd is the only black Republican in the House. “I go into communities that most Republicans don’t show up to take a conservative message and when you have this being the debate, that activity becomes even harder,” said Hurd. He said comments like these are counterproductive to taking conservative ideas to communities that don’t identify with the Republican Party.

“I’m from Texas and if the Republican Party doesn’t start looking like Texas, there won’t be a Republican Party in Texas, and I think that goes for the rest of the country,” said Hurd.

On Sunday, the president said that it was interesting that progressive Democratic congresswomen who originally came from countries whose governments were “a complete and total catastrophe” were telling Americans how government is to be run. “You can’t leave fast enough,” he tweeted, aimed at Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rep. Ayanna Pressley, Rep. Rashida Tlaib, and Rep. Ilhan Omar.