And before you say that that was in the past: would you give the same grace to Republicans for some of the nativists in the party back in the late 19th century?
I would. The fact of the matter is, neither party really has a clean record in regards to race.
Even Abraham Lincoln's original views on race were pretty unorthodox in comparison to those of most people today, yet he is widely admired today and those things are frequently overlooked because of the good things that he did. There were plenty of racist Democrats, yes, but the view of a social hierarchy that divides the races was a very common one in spite of partisan differences.
