'Jim Jones of American politics': Al Sharpton shows how Trump's following could collapse

Former President Donald Trump is effectively presiding over a cult, said minister and longtime civil rights activist Al Sharpton on MSNBC Friday. And that is the key reason his influence is so hard to unseat among his supporters.

However, Sharpton said, this also points to a way that his hold on the GOP could ultimately become undone.

"I have always been obsessed and almost fixated with the asymmetry," said anchor Nicolle Wallace. "So Trump's bond with his supporters is cult-like. And that's bad and toxic in all the ways that a cult is bad and toxic. And it has the consequence of having them go out and do things for him that in a political and electoral context regardless of ... a conviction. The other candidates raised their hand and said they, too, will support him if he was convicted. How do you contest, in the political arena, someone who goes into the political arena as a cult leader?"

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"I think that the only way you can contest him is to confront what is produced by the cult," said Sharpton. "And that is that, if you're going to be the Jim Jones of American politics, sooner or later people will realize the Kool-Aid they get you to drink is going to kill you. And that is what I think will, in the long run happen that will dwindle down, because they will not achieve anything at the end of the day."

This is best exemplified by the conspiracy theories Trump has put forward about his 2020 election loss, said Sharpton.

"Anyone that was on the Trump ticket with them was robbed," continued Sharpton. "He was saying he was robbed. And in Georgia, he's saying the Republicans that supported him, that voted for him, is he saying they robbed him? They're the ones that refused to give him the 11,780 votes that he said you can say that you recounted or went over it."

"So, at some point people will begin to realize that he is giving us something that's totally self-serving and was corrupt," Sharpton added. "I think that will dwindle over time. I think he knows that. At the end of the day, the Wizard of Oz knew that if they ever got behind the curtain, he was not a wizard."

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Al Sharpton calls Trump the "Jim Jones of American politics"www.youtube.com