Trump campaign enters dangerous new phase

Yelling escalated into pushing, then punching. On Friday, it boiled over. A black heckler emerged Friday afternoon from a rally with a bloody mouth, and the rest of the night was lost to violence between protesters and the thousands of supporters who came to see the GOP front-runner.

Trump and his team quickly deflected, and blamed the mob for trying to disrupt a peaceful, scheduled rally.

“I don’t take responsibility,” Trump told CNN. “Nobody’s been hurt at our rallies.”

Others defended Trump’s point, including some of his rivals. Even Sen. Marco Rubio, who Trump has mocked as “little Marco,” said protesters had no right to disrupt Trump’s event.

But Rubio said Trump himself was to blame for the escalation in violence, and said there’s nothing the Republican Party itself can do without Trump’s help.

“Donald Trump is responsible for his own rhetoric,” Rubio said. “The tone and tenor of Donald Trump’s rally over the last few months has been disturbing to a lot of people.”

Sen. Ted Cruz, Trump’s greatest primary threat, jumped at the chance to say the outbreak of violence means Trump is the wrong man to nominate to lead Republicans.

“[T]here’s no doubt that a candidate bears responsibility for the culture that is set from the top,” he said on Hugh Hewitt’s radio show. Cruz said some of it was the way Trump was trying to build support, by asking people to pledge allegiance to him.

“And part of that is reflected on how you approach protesters, because if you are the monarch from on high, then the predator is disloyal and needs to be cast out and punished,” he said.

Democrats have long argued that Trump is a dangerous candidate who launched his campaign by immediately calling for tougher immigration enforcement, which Democrats say raised racial tensions. But now Republicans are saying Trump is dangerous, and with many in the press agreeing, Trump seems to be surrounded.

The New York Daily News drove the point home with a front page picture of the bloodied protester with the headline, “Blood on Don’s Hands.”

Eggheads will debate whether the mob is unjustly violating Trump’s right to free speech, or whether Trump is so vile he must be stopped at all costs. But that debate may not matter to Trump, whose immediate future seems likely to be filled with more violence at his events.

In Chicago, protesters tasted a victory of sorts against Trump just by forcing him to cancel the rally, and it’s easy to imagine others trying to replicate that result wherever Trump speaks next.

On the other side, many were already predicting on Twitter that like everything else that’s been thrown at Trump, he’s unlikely to be daunted by protesters, or even wounded by them. And the violence seems likely to give Trump supporters more reason to rally around their candidate.

Pollster Frank Luntz said when the dust settles, Trump’s fans will get to the polls, getting him closer to the nomination, and closer to… who knows what next?