Susan Rice: Consequences of Trump’s ‘raw racism’ not contained in US

President Trump’s rhetoric is triggering increased white supremacist attacks globally and diminishing America’s ability to fight foreign human rights abuses, said former President Obama’s national security adviser Susan Rice.

“Yet, the consequences of Mr. Trump’s raw racism are not contained within America’s shores. They ricochet around the world as far away as New Zealand, poison the international climate and undermine America’s ability to secure our global interests,” Rice wrote in an op-ed published Tuesday in The New York Times.  

Rice’s latest criticism of Trump comes on the heels of two mass shootings that killed at least 31 people in El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio.{mosads}

Police say the accused shooter in the El Paso attack wrote a white nationalist manifesto that Democrats have called out for echoing the president’s words in tweets and campaign rallies. 

The white supremacist behind the mosque shooting in Christchurch, New Zealand, in March also wrote a manifesto ahead of his attack. In it, he cited support for Trump. 

Democrats recently rebuked the president’s tweet telling a group of Democratic congresswomen to “go back” to “the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came.”

A few weeks later he was criticized for a series of tweets attacking Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.) and Baltimore, calling it “rodent infested.” 

“That allied leaders, whose countries’ partnership we prize because they share both our interests and our values, felt compelled to condemn the president’s racist comments marks a fresh nadir in global regard for America’s leadership,” Rice said. 

“When the president of the United States reveals himself to be an unabashed bigot, attacking minorities in his own country, America’s ability to stand credibly against human rights abuses, especially repression of minorities in other countries — from the Uighurs in China to Shiites in Bahrain and Christians throughout the Middle East — is thwarted in ways lasting and immeasurable,”  she wrote.

Trump’s words are also dividing and weakening America, Rice said. 

The weakened state leaves the electorate open to attacks similar to the 2016 presidential campaign when, “Russian trolls stoked American white nationalism while amplifying black anger about police brutality in an effort to suppress the African-American vote,” Rice wrote.

“Our domestic fault lines remain our greatest national security vulnerability, and race is our oldest and deepest rift. When the president deliberately and repeatedly rubs salt in those wounds, while coddling the authoritarian opponents who exploit them, we must reluctantly ask ourselves: Is he playing on America’s team?” she concluded.