As President Donald Trump’s belligerence continues to put the nation and world in increased danger through means like the abrupt recent U.S. airstrike killing top Iranian General Qassem Suleimani, the Republican Party that put him in office keeps spouting some of that same belligerence. Now, a Delaware Republican Party official is resigning in disgrace after using an anti-gay slur on Facebook, which attracted condemnation from some both inside and outside of his party. New Castle County GOP Chair Chris Rowe’s resignation was announced by state Republican Party leadership, who seem to be the ones to have appointed him in the first place.
Still, in the same statement in which she indicated she asked for Rowe’s resignation, the state’s Republican Party chair Jane Brady insisted that Rowe’s comments “did not reflect the values of respect and tolerance held dear by the Delaware Republican Party.” State Democratic Party Chairman Erik Raser-Schramm called Brady’s “tepid initial response… beyond disappointing, particularly at a time when deadly violence targeting Jewish Americans is spiking across the country and protections for LGBTQ+ Americans are being rolled back by the White House.”
Rowe is not even the only Delaware GOP official to face criticism over recent bigoted remarks. Sussex County GOP Vice-Chair Nelly Jordan has also been criticized for anti-Semitic rhetoric about national politics, but Jordan was elected to her position, so obtaining her resignation is apparently less easy than in Rowe’s case. That county’s Republican Party chair Don Petitmermet insisted that he takes the situation “very seriously” and “procedures for evaluating the conduct of our members and holding them accountable… have been used in the past and will be scrupulously adhered to in this case as well.”
Republican state Sen. Anthony Delcollo, who’d demanded Rowe’s and Jordan’s resignations, said that he was “just pretty beside myself with it.” Indicating exactly how Trumpism helps define the serious problem here, Rowe had previously defended his comment as — wait for it — “locker room talk.” That phrase is, of course, the exact same “defense” that the president himself came up with when confronted with a tape of him bragging about committing sexual assault.
Delcollo insisted:
‘The vast majority of people that have responded to [my statement], including a large number of Republicans, have agreed with me and thanked me for standing up for what’s right. My hope is that people will see that that’s the real character of folks who also happen to be Republicans.’
That’s an extremely tall order — to say the least — while the endlessly belligerent, vitriol-spewing Donald Trump remains leading the party. A simple check of his personal Twitter feed will reveal the kind of gross egomania that has come to even more publicly define the Republican Party thanks to his leadership. The majority of Republicans in D.C. and elsewhere are consistently falling in line.
They’ve gotten increasingly outrageous in their Trump defenses, too. During the recent final round of debate before the House formally impeached Trump, Republicans even compared the impeachment to the trial of Jesus — who was crucified — and the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Is there any bottom with them?
