DURHAM, N.C.—Donald Trump’s presidential candidacy is imploding.

The leak of Trump’s jaw-dropping 2005 remarks about women, in which he boasted that he kisses and gropes them without their consent, has sent his campaign into a historic crisis that looks a lot like an unstoppable death spiral.

The Republican National Committee decided Saturday to move its money away from Trump and spend it instead on congressional candidates, the Wall Street Journal reported, a decision that amounts to the party conceding defeat in the presidential race.

And more than 20 Republican governors, senators and congresspeople across the country, who had previously stood by Trump despite 16 months of gaffes, incendiary statements and outright bigotry, either said they would not vote for him or called on him to drop out of the race.

The defectors included 2008 Republican presidential nominee John McCain, the Arizona senator, who said Trump’s “boasts about sexual assaults make it impossible to continue to offer even conditional support for his candidacy.” Former secretary of state Condoleezza Rice wrote on Facebook: “Enough! Donald Trump should not be president. He should withdraw.”

Most of the party’s elected officials did not rescind their support. But the mass divorce 30 days before election day was unprecedented, especially given the prominence of the participants. Among them were senators from New Hampshire, Colorado, Idaho, Utah, and the Senate’s third-ranking Republican member, South Dakota’s John Thune, who wrote on Twitter: “Donald Trump should withdraw and Mike Pence should be our nominee effective immediately.”

“I think he had a very small chance of winning the election 48 hours ago anyway. And that number is now zero,” Matt Mackowiak, a Texas-based Republican strategist, said in an interview. “The reason for that is, he has alienated the only constituency he could have won additional votes from, and that’s college-educated white women.”

Even Trump’s wife, Melania, issued a statement through his campaign saying his words were “unacceptable and offensive to me,” though she said they did not reflect the man she knows. Pence, his running mate and a social conservative, refused to speak on his behalf, issuing a statement saying he was “offended.”

Mackowiak, a Trump critic, said the party was now on a “death march.” Trump’s minimum support, he said, might now be 30 or 32 per cent, a disastrous showing that would allow the Democrats to win back not only the Senate but the House of Representatives.

Mackowiak said Clinton even has some chance of winning Texas, where she trailed by seven points in a recent poll.

“Places that weren’t even in play are now in play. States where Hillary hasn’t even spent a nickel on the air are states where she might now win. I truly think this is apocalyptic for the party,” he said. “The problem is, Donald Trump doesn’t care about the Republican Party.”

Trump issued a video just after midnight Saturday in which he made the first specific apology of his no-holds-barred campaign. But he did not seem especially contrite, pivoting from saying he was “wrong” to calling the matter “nothing more than a distraction” and alleging that Bill Clinton “actually abused women.”

He was even less apologetic on Saturday, telling the Wall Street Journal, “People get it. They get life.”

“Certainly has been an interesting 24 hours!” he wrote on Twitter. Then, later, he added: “The media and establishment want me out of the race so badly — I WILL NEVER DROP OUT OF THE RACE, WILL NEVER LET MY SUPPORTERS DOWN!”

But with precisely one month until voting on Nov. 8, and early voting already underway, analysts said it was nearly impossible to imagine a Trump recovery, though the businessman with no political experience has defied expectations before. Clinton had established a large lead of five points even before the story broke.

Trump has a chance to change the prevailing narrative at least slightly on Sunday night, when he will debate Clinton for the second time. But the timing means he will almost certainly face difficult attacks on the subject. And the “town hall” format, where they will take questions from undecided voters, is poorly suited to an attempt to whack Clinton with the transgressions of her husband.

Clinton stayed silent on Saturday, preferring to stay out of the way as Trump faltered. Other Democrats were scathing. In a tweet he signed “Joe” to signify he had personally written it, Vice-President Joe Biden said, “The words are demeaning. Such behaviour is an abuse of power. It’s not lewd. It’s sexual assault.”

Trump made the remarks to Access Hollywood host Billy Bush 11 years ago. They were captured by a live microphone and leaked recently to the Washington Post.

Trump discussed his attempts to seduce a married woman. He then said, of “beautiful” women, “I just start kissing them. It’s like a magnet. Just kiss. I don’t even wait.” He added: “And when you’re a star, they let you do it.” Finally, he said, “Grab them by the p---y. You can do anything.”

The remarks brought renewed attention to Trump’s extensive history of sexism and to unproven accusations that he has in fact committed sexual assault, which he denies. His first wife, Ivana, once accused him of “rape,” though she later said that word should not be “interpreted in a literal or criminal sense,” and he has been sued for alleged assaults by at least two women.

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Regardless, the Republicans who divorced with Trump were taking a substantial risk. He remains intensely popular with much of the party base. When Speaker Paul Ryan held a rally on Saturday in his Wisconsin district, after disinviting Trump, he was booed and heckled by Trump supporters.

In phone interviews, three supporters said they did not support the remarks but that they remained as committed to Trump as ever.

Rebecca DeBoer, 68, a former Oregon state legislator and now the leader of the North Hillsborough Republican Club in the Tampa area, said she has heard worse language in rap music and from men who played golf on the course she once lived beside. Marsha Craig, 71, a member of the club, said, “I’m not thrilled with the words he said, but the comments he made are not uncommon in our culture. I think that’s locker room talk, and it’s both men and women that do that, and it was 11 years ago.”

More on thestar.com

Trump issues apology for lewd conversation about women in 2005

Trump’s comments prompt Republican backlash, calls to resign

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