No Joking Matter: Democrats Aren’t Laughing At Donald Trump Anymore

When Donald Trump announced his bid for the GOP nomination, Democrats everywhere didn’t even bother to hide their laughter. Shortly after the real estate mogul and former entertainer made his descent down an escalator at his own Trump Tower and announced his bid, the Democratic National Committee quickly issued a statement that poked fun both at Trump and Republicans in general.

“Today, Donald Trump became the second major Republican candidate to announce for president in two days. He adds some much-needed seriousness that has previously been lacking from the GOP field, and we look forward to hearing more about his ideas for the nation.”

It never occurred to either Democrats or Republicans that Donald Trump would be taken seriously as a candidate. And then, despite saying outrageous comments that ranged from calling Mexicans rapists, poking fun openly at a disabled journalist, and saying that, as president, he would deny entry to the United States based upon religion, Donald Trump began to rise in the polls.

Or, in retrospect, perhaps it was because Donald Trump made such outrageous statements that he continued to rise in the polls.

It was still believed, though, as Trump continued his ascension, that there was a “ceiling” of support for the businessman. But as Trump continued to outperform the “ceiling” predictions, that “ceiling” kept getting raised a little higher. And although the other two GOP contenders, Senators Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio, still cling to that hope, it’s becoming less and less likely.

Both senators contend that 60 or 70 percent of Republican primary voters refuse to back Trump. And, awhile ago, that was true — last March, when voters were asked if they would support Trump, 74 percent said no. When Trump announced his candidacy, that number dropped to a still-large 66 percent. But by September, as Trump was firmly position on top of the polls, that number had dropped to 52 percent.

And when asked the same question in January, the number of Republican primary voters who claimed they could never support Trump dropped to a mere 34 percent, which is not much higher than the percentage of voters who said they would never support Rubio or Cruz.

And although both Cruz and Rubio seem unable to admit that there may not be a magical ceiling that will prevent Trump from garnering the GOP nomination, the Democrats are no longer laughing. The “joke” of a Donald Trump candidacy is no longer funny, and many are urging Republicans to do something before allowing Trump to become their party’s nominee.

“For months everyone said someone else will catch on, but it seems that they better start catching because he’s moving down the road,” Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid said.

Reid believes that Trump will be the GOP nominee, and for him, the thought is a frightening one.

“For me it’s kind of scary what he talks about,” Reid said.

Reid’s comments came after Trump won the Republican caucuses in Reid’s home state of Nevada on Tuesday, his third consecutive victory after the New Hampshire and South Carolina primaries.

Those victories, Democrats point out, are happening in spite of Trump’s repeated explosive remarks about Mexicans, Muslims, women, and other groups and individuals — or, perhaps because of them. Despite pundits and politicians predicting for months that Trump would bomb spectacularly, his wins indicate that large portions of the GOP base support him.

What Democrats find so frightening about that is that it indicates Trump’s extremist views are, perhaps, not so extreme within the Republican electorate.

Democratic senator Bob Menendez of New Jersey, the only Latino Democratic senator, said that he has “never seen a greater confluence of challenges at one time” for the Latino community. And the inflammatory rhetoric used by Trump and others in regards to Mexico and immigration is frightening.

“When I look at what is happening across the landscape of the political discourse in this country and I hear the language about walls and deportation and no more birthright citizenship and the list goes on and on, I recoil thinking that we are going back to a time and place that none of us want to go to.”

He also said he has “learned over a lifetime that [comments about undocumented immigrants] are not about the undocumented alone, they’re about all of us,” referring to all Latinos.

But Trump’s stance on immigration is not unique to him. Cruz has also called for mass deportation, and Rubio has said he would immediately end the president’s relief for undocumented immigrants who came to the U.S. as children.

Senator Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) pointed out that those comments represent a marked shift in belief for Rubio, who once helped draft and pass a bill through the Senate a comprehensive reform bill that included assistance, back in 2013.

“I’m very disappointed,” said Durbin, who was also part of the so-called “gang of eight.”

For Democrats, it is clear that they may very well be dealing with Donald Trump as the actual GOP nomination. And although Democrats are no longer laughing at Donald Trump’s run for the presidency, there is one potential upside for liberals: the increasingly inflammatory rhetoric coming from the right against immigration could motivate a larger block of Latino voters to get to the poll, where they tend to swing democratic.

[Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images News]