To the editor:

Last week, Donald Trump insinuated that Judge Gonzalo Curiel, a federal judge, was biased against Trump because of the color of Curiel’s skin. The charge was that Judge Curiel was intentionally and unjustly ruling against Mr. Trump due to his stances on immigration and the judge’s Latino ancestry (despite being born in Indiana). For the record, there is very little to support that this is true, outside of Mr. Trump’s own conjecture. In addition, many of the facts about Judge Curiel suggest that he is, at the very least, a fair jurist. He has been appointed and lauded by both sides of the aisle, including Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (who appointed him to the California state bench) and President Barack Obama (who appointed him to the federal bench). Before he was a judge, he served for 25 years as a prosecutor in Southern California, charging and sending to prison people in drug cases most of whom have Mexican heritage.

But this is all of secondary importance. Because the more important issue is that the presumptive nominee of the Republican Party has suggested that a federal judge is corrupt and given no other evidence than 1) the judge ruled against him and 2) the judge is a person of color. Taken by itself, we could see this as an isolated incident. Perhaps a moment where frustration led to poorly chosen set of words. But this is far from an isolated incident when it comes to Mr. Trump. Taken with his description of Mexican immigrants, his proposal to restrict immigration based upon religion, and the reality that this is the second time this charge has been made, it is clear that a pattern of blatant racism is developing around Mr. Trump. This is, frankly, an outrage, and is a pattern that Mr. Trump must stop immediately if he is even to be considered as president of the United States.

I call upon Mr. Trump to stop with the racist comments and proposals. I call upon our local elected leaders to repudiate Mr. Trump’s comments. And I call upon all of us to look clearly both at what our candidates say and do in the coming months and vote accordingly in November. We cannot and should not reward the racist rants and policies of Donald Trump with the White House. If he cannot stop them, we as voters need to vote for someone else.

Joey Feldmann

Fort Dodge