No Democrat or political opponent of Donald Trump has ever displayed genuine "contempt" for his MAGA supporters to the degree that the president himself does, according to New York Times columnist Jamelle Bouie — and there is a specific reason his backers let him get away with it.

In one of his recent "Takes" videos posted to YouTube, Bouie highlighted what he called a "striking" remark Trump made at one of ongoing midterm campaign rallies. Speaking about the "love" he felt from the crowd gathered in Clarksville, Tennessee, Trump told supporters, "I could say the stupidest things, and you clap." The remark is one more entry in a midterm-season rally schedule that keeps Trump's direct addresses to his own base in steady rotation heading into the elections.

Bouie connected the comment to the same mindset behind Trump's infamous claim during his first presidential campaign that he could "stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody" without losing any voters. In Bouie's view, such statements expose a deep well of contempt for Trump's most devoted followers, reflecting how little the president thinks of their morals and intelligence.

These remarks, Bouie added, are far harsher than anything Democrats have said about Republican and MAGA voters. He pointed to three episodes involving former President Barack Obama, former First Lady Hillary Clinton, and former President Joe Biden — comments that drew heavy criticism even though their full context made them considerably more respectful than Trump's statements about his own backers.

Obama was attacked as "elitist" during his first presidential campaign in 2008 for saying that rural voters clung to "guns and religion," though he had made the observation with sympathy, explaining that people took comfort in concrete things as the world changed around them. Clinton was assailed during her 2016 campaign for describing Trump supporters as "a basket of deplorables," even though her full remarks drew a clear distinction between reasonable Trump supporters and those who backed him out of shared bigotries. Biden, meanwhile, was criticized for supposedly calling Trump supporters "garbage," a remark made in reference to backers such as comedian Tony Hinchcliffe, who had called Puerto Rico a "floating island of garbage." Each of those remarks went on to serve as a durable Republican attack line in later campaigns, held up as evidence of Democratic disdain for Trump's base.

"You could play this game all day long," Bouie said. "Nothing Democrats have said about Trump or his supporters really matches what Trump himself has said about them. Why it doesn't register like that is, in part, the double standard that exists: Republicans are effectively allowed to talk trash about large swaths of the public, and Democrats have to defer endlessly out of a sense that they don't really represent 'Real America,' no matter how many real Americans call themselves Democrats."

He added: "And part of this is just the way that the political media does treat Republicans is almost as a force of nature, something that you can't expect to be better. But either way, it's striking. It's striking the level of contempt that Donald Trump has for his voters. It's striking, the level of contempt that Republican politicians show for their voters, where they will tell them all kinds of insane falsehoods and expect them to be lapped up with no obstacle." His framing taps into a long-running debate over whether coverage weighs comparable statements from the two parties by the same measure.

Bouie argued, however, that it "takes two to tango" in this unusual dynamic, suggesting that the real reason Republicans are able to treat their supporters poorly without consequence is that those supporters recognize the arrangement and allow it to play out.

"The fact these voters eat up this contempt, don't seem bothered by it, is instructive as well because it's telling you that they're not really voting for Trump or supporting Trump for respect or for recognition," he concluded. "Because they understand that even if he doesn't respect them, they share hatreds, and those shared hatreds are what absolutely matter the most." With the midterm campaign season still underway, additional rallies on Trump's schedule will keep putting this dynamic between the president and his crowds on public display.

Bouie's full commentary is available in his "Takes" video series on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EPTZGTapay8