Black Florida Republican announces he's leaving the GOP because Trump's racism fuels 'the potential for a race war'

Rev. O'Neal Dozier, a black Florida conservative who campaigned for a number of Republican candidates, announced in an editorial Thursday that he is leaving the party because of President Donald Trump's divisive stances on white supremacists and the protests of NFL players.

"For the last 30 years, I have been a faithful and dedicated member of the Republican Party," Dozier wrote in the South Florida Times. "But now, I am announcing that I am leaving the Republican Party to become an Independent because I can no longer with good conscience remain a member of a political party that is headed by President Donald Trump."

Dozier, who served as co-chairman for the Rick Santorum's failed 2012 presidential campaign, wrote that Trump "refuses to denounce these hateful groups because he believes they are part of his voting base and they helped him to become president," and has failed to condemn those groups the way other Republican presidents have done in the past.

"President Trump’s past and present actions and attitude towards black people are causing white people and the Republican Party to become more insensitive to the plight of black people," Dozier wrote.

"President Trump picked this fight with the NFL players in order to throw red meat to his base," he continued. "He will feed his base anything he thinks they like in order to keep them on his plantation. He knows exactly what they like and don’t like."

The reverend charged Trump with heightening racial tensions and fueling "the potential for a race war in America."

Trump's "ungodly character and personality is corrupting, redefining and destroying the Republican Party," Dozier said, and as such, he can no longer count himself among their membership.

You can read the entire editorial via the South Florida Times.