The former El Paso Democratic congressman also urged journalists to "connect those dots" between Trump's words and attacks on minority communities.

"This is the most racist President we've had since perhaps Andrew Johnson, in another age and another century, and he is responsible for the hatred and the violence that we're seeing right now," O'Rourke said in an interview with CNN's Chris Cuomo on "Cuomo Prime Time."

O'Rourke told Cuomo that he "cannot leave that just to me to say that. It's got to be you, and those who are helping this country understand what is happening in our name, to connect those dots of these actions that can seem unconnected or disparate or random or just strange."

He continued: "They're all of a pattern, and they all follow what this President has said from that maiden speech when he ran for the highest office of the land."

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