Hiding Their Out-of-Touch Agenda in Plain Sight

Nearly six weeks ago, the Republicans met on stage in Ohio and confirmed that, across the board, they support an out of touch, out of date agenda that will be devastating to American families trying to get ahead and stay ahead. From going even further in limiting women’s health care choices to over-heated vitriol on issues like immigration and labor to failing to mention the middle class, the Republicans made clear that our suspicions from the campaign trail were right: they have the wrong vision for America.

In the intervening weeks, as Donald Trump has solidified his lead in state and national polls, a surprising thing has happened: the Republicans have tried more of the same — only louder. Rather than differentiate themselves from an extreme agenda that is very unpopular with most voters, the Republicans have doubled down, trying to out-Trump Trump as they match their right-wing positions with offensive rhetoric. As Hillary Clinton has noted, they’re turning the Party of Lincoln into the Party of Trump — and they show no signs of stopping.

That’s when we knew what we had to do to prepare for the debate. Rather than point out their own records — and believe me, there’s a lot to talk about there — we figured we’d let the Republicans speak for themselves. And boy, have they been talking.

In case you’ve not been following the race over the summer, or if it’s too hard to cut through the press around Donald Trump rallies, here’s what you’ve missed:

• Donald Trump introduced his mass deportation plan and noted he would shut down the government over Planned Parenthood…just for a start.
• Jeb Bush claimed Planned Parenthood doesn’t actually do women’s health, attacked American citizens by calling them “anchor babies” and proposed trillions in new tax cuts for the wealthiest few.
• Scott Walker briefly supported building a wall along the Canadian border and stepped up his war on working families by announcing a plan to eliminate federal workers unions.
• Ben Carson (a doctor) said victims of rape or incest should just quickly run to the emergency room to avoid pregnancy.
• Ted Cruz supported breaking the law in order to oppose marriage equality.
• Marco Rubio reiterated his position that victims of rape or incest should not be allowed to have access to safe abortions.
• Mike Huckabee offered to go to jail in order to defend his opposition to marriage equality.
• Rand Paul (also a doctor) made the outrageous claim that people with jobs don’t have time to do heroin. This was his response to a question about the serious epidemic facing our country.
• John Kasich said raising the minimum wage could create morale problems for higher paid workers and argued that shutting down the government is an effective tool.
• Chris Christie proposed treating immigrants like FedEx packages.
• Carly Fiorina announced that she opposes guaranteed paid maternity leave and, in an interview this week, supported a government shutdown over Planned Parenthood funding.

Over the last day, the Briefing’s Twitter feed has been offering a sampling of 26 of the most egregious Republican comments since the last debate. You can find the full list at www.GOPABCs.com, our new site. You can see some of them at work in our new video: Previously, on the last President Campaign Apprentice.

We expect lots of fireworks tonight as the other candidates try to get in their soundbites and take on Trump, but beneath the heated language and bombast, they’re telling us exactly what they’ll do as president. We just need to listen.