Trump showed the GOP they can be as racist as they want to be They don’t care about no woke criticism. They’re just going for it: Donald Trump is getting headlines for saying immigrants are “poisoning the blood of our country.” But for months the GOP race for president has been shadowed by xenophobia, as some candidates or those backing them have embraced racist and white nationalist themes. It’s partly a reflection of how Trump has moved Republican politics toward the harder-edged, “us vs. them” view that now dominates the GOP’s base and is reshaping its membership in Congress. This is from Axios. It’s nice that they’ve noticed it’s not just Trump. It’s very important to report this because there may be a handful of people who have always voted Republican who are not exactly on board with the crudeness of this. (The dog whistles always provided deniability.) Even as the GOP has recruited more minority prospects for public office — this year’s initial field for the presidential race was historically diverse — more Republicans are latching onto Trump’s racially divisive rhetoric. Vivek Ramaswamy, the son of Indian immigrants, has won fans among white nationalists for promoting the “Great Replacement Theory,” a racist conspiracy theory that nonwhite people are being allowed into the U.S. and other Western countries to replace white voters. Ramaswamy, who among the GOP candidates has been particularly reluctant to criticize Trump, also has campaigned with former Rep. Steve King, an Iowa Republican who has said that U.S. culture can’t be restored “with somebody else’s babies” and…