Trump Is Now Doing Damage Control With Southern Voters He Managed To Offend

The Dotard Inquisition

Señor Trumpanzee has been mocking Jeff Sessions as a dumb southerner for some time, thinking no one "outside" would pick up on his bigotry and that his "dumb" supporters in Alabama, the Florida Panhandle, Georgia, the Carolinas, Virginia, Mississippi, Arkansas and southern Missouri would ever figure out that a snob he is and that what he says about Mexicans publicly is what he says about them behind their backs. It would be fatal for him if they do-- which is why he's been shrieking on Twitter than Bob Bernstein is a Democratic operative and a purveyor of "fake news"-- lies like everything else Trump uses to manipulate his base, especially "dumb" southerners.

Yesterday, the Washington Post reported that Southern Republican senators-- usually Trump's most lock-step ass-kissing enablers and rubber-stamps-- were pushing back. Several explicitly defended Jeff Sessions from the Trump attacks exposed in Fear, Woodward new book. Trump's mockery of southern accents has been an ongoing disgrace that has gone largely unnoticed. Woodward wrote that the illegitimate "president" privately called Sessions a "traitor," saying: "This guy is mentally retarded. He’s this dumb Southerner… He couldn’t even be a one-person country lawyer down in Alabama."

Johnny Isakson (R-GA), obviously seething: "I’m a Southerner. People can judge my intellect, my IQ, by my product and what I produce rather than what somebody else says. We’re a pretty smart bunch. We lost the Civil War, but I think we’re winning the economic war since then… I’m not gonna get into name-calling because I don’t think you should be allowed to call names-- including the president."

 Richard Shelby (R-AL), a long-time friend and colleague of Sessions noted that it would be politically stupid of Trump to denigrate Southerners since they hugely helped elect the president in 2016. "Well, I’m sure I’ve got that accent, wouldn’t you think?... I guess the president-- he says what he thinks... I think the president’s probably got a lot of respect for the South. I hope so. He did well there. Without the South, he wouldn’t be the president of the United States... "I think that’s strong words. I think Sessions is a very smart man and a man of integrity. I would disagree with the president on that."

Trump has been on Twitter calling attention to Woodward's book-- likely making it a best seller-- and defending himself in ways that it will be hard to believe by anyone who isn't already brainwashed by his cult of personality.

But Republican incumbents and and open red seat candidates in the South didn't need this new bullshit from Trump. Barbara Comstock (R-VA), Andy Barr (R-KY), Mark Harris (R-NC), John Culberson (R-TX), French Hill (R-AR), Maria Salazar (R-FL), Will Hurd (R-TX), Karen Handel (R-GA), Denver Riggelman (R-VA), Carol Miller (R-WV), Pete Sessions (R-TX), Scott Taylor (R-VA), Carlos Curbelo (R-FL) and Dave Brat (R-VA) are all in tough districts and none them can afford to lose a couple of points based on Trump being perceived as being a snob against the South. If a percentage point or two is shaved off anyone's totals because people who take offense stay home, these candidates will be even more certain to be defeated in November.