Harry Reid!

[Content Note: Bigotry.]

This girl Senate Minority Leader is on fire!

Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) on Thursday delivered a fierce rebuke of the Republican Party and its top leaders, who he argues paved the way for the rise of presidential front-runner Donald Trump.

GOP voters' embrace of Trump, Reid said in the speech delivered at the Center for American Progress, is a direct and predictable consequence of Republican strategies dating back to the beginning of President Obama's term.

"The Republican establishment acts bewildered," Reid said. "But they should not be bewildered. As much as they may try to distance themselves from Trump now, Republican leaders are responsible for his rise."

"Republican leaders created the drought conditions; Donald Trump has simply struck the match," he added.

..."On issue after issue, Republican leaders faced a choice: Help their constituents put food on the table, literally, or stick it to President Obama. Time after time, Republicans chose to stick it to President Obama instead of helping their own constituents."

He added: "Republicans spent eight years torching the institutions Americans once relied on to help them face the challenges of their daily lives. Instead of engaging on policy, Republicans simply told Americans there was nothing to be done. So what thrived in the wasteland Republican leaders created? Resentment, hatred — which Republican leaders were all too eager to embrace and too cowardly to renounce."

Hey, that sounds familiar! Except for the part about the origins of this national nightmare being only 8 years old. This dumpster fire has been decades in the making.

Still, it's pretty great to (finally) hear a prominent Democrat full-throatedly call out this stuff.

"Donald Trump's style of no-holds-barred politics was forged in the Senate Republican caucus," he continued. "If Sen. McConnell wonders from where Donald Trump came, he should take a look in the mirror. No one is working harder to support Trump than Mitch McConnell."

...Reid called on both McConnell and House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) to "withdraw their support of Donald Trump, and do it now."

"For too long, Senator McConnell and Speaker Ryan have tried to have it both ways, giving Trump occasionally a slap on the wrist each time he says something detestable, but always committing to support him at the end of the day. This is precisely the kind of moral cowardice that enabled the rise of Trump," Reid said.

"After years of refusing to denounce birtherism, McConnell and Ryan are now supporting the most prominent birther in the nation," he continued. "Why are they waiting to withdraw their support? What more do they need to see? … There is no grey area here. It is time for Sen. McConnell and Speaker Ryan to find the backbone to say: 'Enough, Trump, enough.'"

Hell yeah.

The Washington Post doesn't include this in their report, but Reid went on to say: "If McConnell and Ryan think his racist demagoguery is wrong, they shouldn't support him, period. If they refuse to revoke their support for Trump, they should put on 'Make America Great Again' hats and stand behind Trump at his next press conference." DAMN! A+