Republicans are 'going down with the SS Trump': Former McCain adviser says the GOP is in electoral danger

MSNBC host Stephanie Ruhle described President Donald Trump's weekend as being filled with trying to distract people with "bright shiny objects" in his tweets to divert attention away from the Americans marching in the streets. It didn't work, she said.

Ruhle noted that Republicans are slowly beginning to distance themselves from Trump's failure to empathize with the plight of people of color. Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) confessed she might not even vote for Trump in November. Sen. Mitt Romney (R-UT) marched with protesters in Washington, just steps from Trump's new colossal fence. Then, former Bush Secretary of State Colin Powell called the president dangerous and a liar.

"I think the accumulation of all of it is damaging," said Republican strategist Steve Schmidt. "What we saw here over the last couple of days is these retired four-star officers speaking out and engaging in politics which they are loath to do. But they're not saying we don't like Donald Trump's tax plan or we don't like Donald Trump's approach to health care. What these men who have spent their entire careers, their entire lifetimes in service to the nation as sentinels of the nation's liberty and freedom, what they've said is Donald Trump is a unique threat to Americanism."

Ruhle noted that aside from Murkowski and Romney, most Republicans have been too afraid to come out against the president. Schmidt, a former campaign adviser to Sen. John McCain, warned that Trump is dragging Republicans down with him in 2020.

"Romney and Murkowski are going to come out looking fine when history's lens judges this rancid era," he explained. "When you look at the Senate races right now, Cory Gardner in Colorado, that race is effectively over. The democrat will win. When you look at Martha McSally in Arizona, that race is effectively over. The Democrat will win. When you look at the Senate races all over the country, you see Republican candidates in very, very big trouble and Mitch McConnell's grasp on the Senate majority becoming tenuous."

He explained that Republicans long ago decided to stand with Trump regardless of what he says and does, casting aside "any previous principles, any previous sense of decency, any sense of commitment to the rule of law."

"They signed up to become foot soldiers in a cult of personality for Donald Trump," Schmidt said. "They're going down with the 'SS Trump' if that's what happens in November. And as we look out on that ship on the high seas, the 'SS Trump' proverbial is foundering. It's had a difficult month with these protests, with the total ineptitude and response to coronavirus, and the American people are looking at this man, this man who has not met history's task in a way that is greater than any previous American leader in all of our long history. He has failed at a level that almost defies description in the year 2020. And that's why his poll numbers are cratering against the vice president."

See the interview with Schmidt below: