Here's a strange pivot. Sen. Rick Scott, Florida's former governor, decided to call Democrats anti-Semites Monday after reporters asked him if the now-infamous Trump tweets telling freshmen congresswoman to "go back" to where they came from were racist.

“It was not racist,” Scott said of Trump's tweet. “It was clearly not the way I would do it but let’s remember the position that these Democrats have taken. They’ve become the anti-Semitic party now and so that’s wrong. Our country is not anti-Semitic. They are attacking law enforcement, our border agents and ICE. That’s wrong. These people are doing their job.”



If you haven't heard, the president took to Twitter to say that progressive Democratic congresswomen who criticize the U.S. should instead "go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came."

The tweets targeted Reps. Ilhan Omar (Minn.) Ayanna Pressley (Mass.), Rashida Tlaib (Mich.), and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (N.Y.). Only Omar, whose family fled Somalia when she was a child, was born outside of the United States.
State Sen. Lori Berman, who is both Jewish and a Democrat, called Scott out on the comments.



"As a proud Jewish-American and strong supporter of the state of Israel I find Rick Scott's comments to be deeply offensive, and his refusal to call Trump's tweets racist equally as offensive," Berman said in a statement. "Rick Scott is trying to use the fallacy that the Democratic Party is anti-Semitic to not have to acknowledge Trump's racist comments."

Terrie Rizzo, chair of the Florida Democratic Party, called Scott's comments “a naked and ugly attempt to divert attention away from Trump’s racist remarks and score political points."

Rizzo pointed out Trump's support among white nationalists, who shouted anti-Semitic chants in Charlottesville. 

"His comments defending Trump’s racism embolden the very groups that promote hate and violence and ignores Democratic Jews and their contributions to the Democratic Party," Rizzo said.

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