Is Donald Trump Racist? Connections To Neo-Nazi Groups Hasn’t Hurt Trump’s Popularity, But Likely To Become Line Of Attack For Democrats

Donald Trump is battling new accusations of racism, revealing what could be a major line of attack against the runaway Republican front-runner in the general election campaign.

Trump has gotten in trouble several times throughout his campaign for statements and releases that critics say are racist, including several statements tied to Neo-Nazi individuals and groups.

That was the case with the latest allegations of racism against Donald Trump. Last week, he retweeted an image poking fun at Jeb Bush, one that happened to originate from a supporter who frequently spewed racist and anti-Semitic statements.

As ATTN reported, the image itself was not racist, but the connection to the original poster appeared to be.

“The account in question, ‘@WhiteGenocideTM,’ posted a photo depicting Republican contender Jeb Bush standing outside one of the businessman’s namesake buildings, holding a “Vote Trump” sign. Trump manually retweeted the post, by quoting @WhiteGenocideTM’s tweet and sending out the post to his followers on Friday morning.

“@WhiteGenocideTM, an account with a little more than 2,400 followers, has a feed mostly dedicated to slanderous posts against immigrant communities, Black people, and Jewish people. Many of the posts on the account are retweets of violence allegedly meted out by those communities. In the bio, the user, who also lists the name as ‘Donald Trumpovitz,’ links to a pro-Adolf Hitler film and lists the location as ‘Jewmerica.'”

While supporters point out that Trump was simply passing along a silly picture of a political opponent, past instances show a more concrete connection to seemingly racist statements. Back in November, Trump shared a “blatantly false” graphic about black-on-white crime, one that claimed 81 percent of white homicide victims were killed by blacks. That number is actually 15 percent.

“@SeanSean252: @WayneDupreeShow @Rockprincess818 @CheriJacobus https://t.co/5GUwhhtvyN”

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 22, 2015

The image claimed it took numbers from the “Crime Statistics Bureau in San Francisco,” but no such agency exists. An investigation found that the image actually originated with a Neo-Nazi group.

Raw Story traced the origin of the image.

“The account’s avatar is a modified swastika used as the symbol of the neo-Nazi German Faith Movement, and the account profile expresses admiration for Adolf Hitler: ‘A detester of any kind of sick perverted dildo waving marxism and liberalism, we Should have listened to the Austrian chap with the little moustache.’

“The image was posted on the conservative Sexy Patriot account shortly before Trump shared it.”

Political experts noted that it was very unlikely that Donald Trump tweeted the image himself. Trump’s political team is responsible for his Twitter page, and on the occasion that Trump does send a message, it comes from his iPhone. The tweet in question was sent with an Android device, indicating that a member of his media team likely saw it and chose to retweet it.

But in today’s age, a candidate’s Twitter page is about on par with a series of press releases, representing the candidate’s actual message. Trump had a chance to retract the tweet or apologize, but did neither, opponents say. The image was later deleted, however.

barred African Americans themselves from obtaining bank mortgages for house purchases https://t.co/s4BKmbxzJe

— Sarah Rhae (@sarah_rhae) January 24, 2016

The incidents, including a series of other times when Trump has re-tweeted images or posts from obviously racist sources, have done little to dull his support. Trump remains atop national polls and holds important leads in New Hampshire and Iowa, the first two states to cast ballots for Republican candidates.

But the racist allegations are not likely to go away for Donald Trump. The issues have resonated on progressive news sites, and experts believe they will come up again during the general election as Democrats try to paint Trump as and out-of-touch racist. The question of whether it will begin to erode his support, which the allegations have not yet done, remains to be seen.

[Photo by Ralph Freso/Getty Images]